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AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS 

OF  THE 

GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT 


A'N  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS 


OF  THE 


"GRAMMAR  OF   ASSENT 


?? 


BY 
JOHN  J.  TOOHEY,  S.J. 


LONGMANS,  GREEN,  AND   CO. 

91  AND  93  FIFTH  AVENUE,  NEW  YORK 

LONDON   AND    BOMBAY 

1906 


Copyright,  190G,  by 
Longmans,  Green,  and  Co. 


The  Plimpton  Press  Norwood  Mass.  U.S.A. 


BRiOQ 


PREFACE 


The  philosophy  of  Cardinal  Newman  is  arousing  such 
widespread  interest  and  is  assuming  such  a  prominence 
in  the  controversial  and  apologetic  literature  of  the 
day,  that  there  seems  to  be  a  call  for  a  work  which 
shall  bring  the  contents  of  that  philosophy  within 
easy  reach  of  inquiring  minds  and  make  it  possible  to 
pursue  with  facility  a  systematic  study  of  it.  The 
present  volume  is  an  attempt  in  this  direction,  as 
regards  that  portion  of  Newman's  philosophy  which 
is  developed  in  the  '"Grammar  of  Assent."  And 
whatever  be  the  individual  judgment  upon  Newman's 
philosophical  system,  it  is  hoped  that  this  Synopsis 
will  commend  itself  to  serious  students  generally,  as 
contributing  in  some  way  towards  an  adjustment  of 
the  claims  of  that  philosophy  upon  our  acceptance. 

This  volume  departs  considerably  from  the  ordinary 
plan  of  a  synopsis:  by  being  thrown  into  the  form  of 
an  index,  it  is  intended  to  serve  at  once  as  an  analytical 
index  to  the  "Grammar  of  Assent,"  as  a  dictionary 
of  Newman's  philosophy,  as  a  catalogue  of  his  doc- 
trines, and  as  a  summary  of  his  arguments.  More- 
over, this  Synopsis  has  not  aimed  at  presenting  a  bare 
outline  or  skeleton  of  Newman's  thought,  such  as  is 
commonly  found  in  a  synopsis  or  index;  it  goes  much 

V 


vi  PREFACE 

further.  As  far  as  is  consistent  with  the  scope  of 
the  book,  Newman  has  been  allowed  to  speak  in  his 
own  words,  without  abridgment;  for  it  was  consid- 
ered that  those  who  should  read  this  Synopsis  would 
be  much  better  satisfied,  if  Newman's  thought  was 
presented  to  them  in  his  own  language,  and  with  a 
certain  fulness,  than  if  it  was  unduly  compressed,  or 
interpreted  for  them  by  the  words  of  another. 

The  cross-references  have  been  made  purposely 
copious,  since  this  course  seemed  to  be  demanded  by 
the  main  object  of  the  book,  which  is  to  make  readily 
accessible  and,  in  a  certain  sense,  to  co-ordinate  the 
various  portions  of  the  "Grammar  of  Assent." 

All  the  proper  names  and  all  the  more  striking  quo- 
tations contained  in  the  "Grammar  of  Assent"  have 
been  inserted  in  their  alphabetical  order.  For  it  may 
easily  happen  that  a  person  may  be  puzzled  what 
headings  to  turn  to  in  order  to  find  certain  passages 
in  the  "Grammar,"  which  nevertheless  may  be  asso- 
ciated in  his  mind  with  certain  quotations  or  proper 
names.  Such  a  perplexity  will  be  forestalled  by  the 
plan  of  indexing  adopted  in  this  volume. 


INDEXED   SYNOPSIS   OF   ^'A  GRAMMAR 

OF  ASSENT" 

The  page  references  are  to  the  current  edition  in  crown  octavo. 
(Longmans,  Green  &  Co.) 

A 

"A  Hidden  God,"  397. 

"  A  man's  enemies  shall  be  they  of  his  own  household/' 
452. 

Abipones,  186. 

Abraham,  376,  435,  441,  442,  446,  464;  the  Seed  of 
Abraham,  485;  487. 

Abstract:  abstract  argument  is  always  dangerous, 
160;  abstract  can  only  conduct  to  abstract,  268; 
vide  Mind,  Notional  Proposition,  and  Notional 
Apprehension. 

Academics  propounded  that  happiness  lay,  not  in 
finding  the  truth,  but  in  seeking  it,  208. 

Academy,  469. 

Accomplishments,  Personal,  —  vide  Useful  Arts. 

Act:  the  circumstances  of  an  act,  however  necessary 
to  it,  do  not  enter  into  the  act,  157;  antecedent 
objections  to  an  act  are  not  sufficient  of  themselves 
to  prohibit  its  exercise,  229;  an  act,  viewed  in  itself, 
is  not  wrong  because  it  is  done  wrongly,  232;  it  may 
be  made  both  when  it  ought  to  be  made  and  when 


2  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Act:  continued. 

it  ought  not,  232;  that  is  to  be  accounted  a  normal 
operation  of  our  nature,  which  men  in  general  do 
actually  instance,  344,  347;  vide  Function,  and 
Man. 

Acta  Martyrum:  quoted,  480. 

Action  of  Life:  those  who  did  but  poorly  at  school, 
when  they  come  into  the  action  of  life,  are  some- 
times suddenly  found  to  have  what  is  called  an  eye 
for  some  particular  work,  76;  such  men  form  their 
views  and  give  their  decision,  when  new  questions 
are  opened,  as  if  they  had  no  need  to  reason;  they 
are  the  reformers,  systematizers,  inventors;  they 
sometimes  fall  into  great  errors,  while  second-rate 
men  who  go  by  rule  come  to  sound  and  safe  con- 
clusions, 76  (vide  Real  Assent). 

Adam,  244,  257,  376. 

Adeste  Fideles,  24. 

^NEiD,  296,  308. 

^SCHYLUS,  273. 

"iEternas  poenas  in  morte  timendum,"  391. 

Affections:  the  imagination  finds  a  means  of  stimu- 
lating those  motive  powers,  82-3  (vide  Imagina- 
tion, Real  Apprehension,  and  Real  Assent); 
conscience  has  an  intimate  bearing  on  our  affec- 
tions and  emotions,  108;  inanimate  things  cannot 
stir  our  affections,  109  (vide  Conscience);  the 
exercise  of  the  affections  strengthens  our  appre- 
hension of  the  object  of  them,  118;  knowledge  must 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  3 

Affections:  continued. 
ever  precede  the    exercise  of    the    affections,    120 
(vide  Reason). 

Africa,  393. 

Agnes,  St.,  477. 

Aids  to  Reflection,  Coleridge's:  quoted,  305. 

Alexander,  Bishop  of  Alexandria,  142,  143. 

Alexander  the  Great,  10,  151,  381;  words  of  Na- 
poleon on  Alexander,  490. 

Alexandria,  142,  483. 

' AXrjdcvav  TO)  KaTa(f)avai  rj  aTTO^avat,  353. 

Algebra:  when  algebra  is  applied  to  geometry,  it  is 
sometimes  in  excess  of  geometrical  truth,  and 
sometimes  falls  short  of  it,  48-9;  262,  263,  265, 
266. 

Alison:  quoted,  334,  428. 

"All  shallows  are  clear,"  47. 

"All  that  the  Father  hath  are  Mine,"  etc.,  137. 

"All  that  they  found,  both  good  and  bad,"  455. 

"  All  the  kingdoms  of  the  world,"  450. 

"Alma  Venus,"  "quae  rerum  naturam  sola  gubernas," 
391. 

America,  242. 

American  States,  325. 

Americans,  33. 

Amort:  quoted,  187  note,  411  note,  412  note. 

Analogy,  Butler's,  344,  382,  496;  quoted,  319,  406-7. 

Anastasia,  St.,  477. 

"And  I,  if  I  be  lifted  up  from  the  earth,"  etc.,  451. 


4  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Angels:  they  may  not  admit  of  being  subjected  to 
numeration,  50;  57,  489. 

Anglican  clergy,  246;  Anglican  orders,  252. 

Anglicanism,  56,  251;  vide  England,  Church  of. 

Anglicans:  —  vide  England,  Church  of;  as  regards 
converts  from  Anglicanism  to  Catholicism,  if  they 
come  from  among  those  who  never  professed  to  be 
quite  certain  of  the  special  strength  of  the  Anglican 
position,  such  men  cannot  be  quoted  as  instances 
of  the  defectibility  of  certitude,  253-4. 

Antecedent  Objections  to  an  act  are  not  sufficient 
of  themselves  to  prohibit  its  exercise,  229  (vide 
Act). 

Antecedent  Reasons:  they  are  in  great  measure 
made  by  ourselves  and  belong  to  our  personal  char- 
acter, 381;  when  negative,  they  are  safe,  381;  the 
established  antecedent  probability  in  favour  of  a 
good  character  can  be  overcome  only  by  singularly 
strong  evidence,  381;  Butler's  argument  in  his 
Analogy  is  an  instance  of  antecedent  reasoning  used 
negatively;  for  he  argues  that  certain  characteris- 
tics of  Christianity  do  not  tell  against  its  Divine 
origin,  unless  their  parallels  discoverable  in  the 
order  of  nature  tell  against  the  Divine  origin  of  the 
natural  system  also,  382;  unbelievers  use  the  ante- 
cedent argument  from  the  order  of  nature  against 
our  belief  in  miracles,  382-3  (vide  Miracles); 
scientific  men  have  argued,  on  purely  antecedent 
grounds,  in  favour  of  the  existence  of  living  beings 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  5 

Antecedent  Reasons:  continued. 

on  other  cosmical  bodies  besides  the  earth,  383; 
theological  conclusions  have  often  been  made  on 
antecedent  reasonings;  but  theological  reasoning 
professes  to  be  sustained  by  a  more  than  human 
power,  and  to  be  guaranteed  by  a  more  than  human 
authority,  383;  conversions  to  Christianity  may 
have  been  made  on  antecedent  reasons;  but  ante- 
cedent probabilities,  confirming  each  other,  may 
make  it  a  duty  in  the  judgment  of  a  prudent  man, 
to  accept  and  believe  a  statement,  as  when  we  feel 
it  right,  in  spite  of  misgivings,  to  oblige  ourselves 
to  believe  the  honesty  of  another,  383. 

Antioch,  478. 

Antiquarian:  we  have  experience  how  a  philosophical 
antiquarian,  by  means  of  an  inscription,  interprets 
the  mythical  traditions  of  former  ages,  261. 

Antoninus,  458. 

Apocalypse:  the  Apocalypse,  as  a  prophecy,  affects 
us  differently  from  the  predictions  of  Isaiah,  either 
because  it  relates  to  undreamed-of  events  still  to 
come,  or  because  it  has  been  fulfilled  long  ago  in 
events  which  have  never  become  history,  446;  133, 
139,  244,  340. 

Apollonia,  483. 

Apollonius  Tyaneus,  376. 

Apollos,  376. 

Apologia,  Newman's  397  note,  496,  498,  500;  Ter- 
tullian's;  quoted,  475. 


6  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Apostles'  Creed,  132. 

Apprehension:  the  apprehension  of  a  proposition  is 
the  imposition  of  a  sense  on  the  terms  of  which  it  is 
composed,  9,  13,  20  (vide  Proposition);  real  appre- 
hension, —  vide  Real  Apprehension;  notional  ap- 
prehension, —  vide  Notional  Apprehension;  it  is 
possible  to  apprehend  without  understanding,  19; 
apprehension  is  notional  in  the  grammarian,  and 
real  in  the  experimentalist  and  philosopher,  20;  it  is 
real  in  the  economist,  and  notional  in  the  schoolboy 
translating,  21-2;  apprehension  of  things  by  means 
of  the  memory,  —  vide  Memory;  apprehension  fol- 
lowing upon  a  creation  of  the  inventive  faculty,  — 
vide  Inventive  Faculty;  since  we  cannot  draw  the 
line  between  the  object  and  the  act,  we  may  say 
that  as  is  the  thing  apprehended,  so  is  the  apprehen- 
sion, 36-7;  it  is  a  concomitant  of  assent,  157. 

Apprehension,  Notional  and  Real:  real  apprehen- 
sion is  the  stronger,  i.e., the  more  vivid  and  forcible, 
11-12,  36-7  (vide  Real  Apprehension);  they  both 
use  the  same  words  and  have  one  origin,  yet  have 
nothing  in  common  in  their  results,  34;  however 
divergent  and  independent  in  their  direction,  they 
cannot  really  be  inconsistent  with  each  other,  34; 
each  has  its  own  excellence  and  its  own  imperfection; 
to  apprehend  notionally  is  to  have  breadth  of  mind, 
but  to  be  shallow;  to  apprehend  really  is  to  be  deep, 
but  to  be  narrow-minded ;  the  latter  is  the  conserva- 
tive  principle  of  knowledge,   and   the  former  the 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  7 

Appkehension,  Notional  and  Real:  continued. 
principle  of  its  advancement,  34;  real  apprehension 
has  the  precedence,  as  being  the  scope  and  end  and 
the  test  of  notional,  34;  they  may  co-exist  in  the 
same  mind,  35;  they  do  not  affect  the  nature  of 
Assent  itself;  but  they  give  it  an  external  character 
corresponding  respectively  to  their  own,  35;  the 
more  fully  the  mind  is  occupied  by  an  experience, 
the  keener  will  be  its  assent  to  it,  35;  real  apprehen- 
sion is  the  stronger,  because  what  is  concrete  exerts 
a  force  and  makes  an  impression  on  the  mind  which 
nothing  abstract  can  rival,  36. 

Arabian  Mythology,  376. 

Architectonic  Faculty:  judgment  in  all  concrete 
matter  is  the  architectonic  faculty,  342. 

Argument:  to  most  men  argument  makes  the  point 
in  hand  only  more  doubtful,  and  considerably  less 
impressive,  94;  when  an  argument  is  in  itself  and 
by  itself  conclusive  of  a  truth,  the  truth  which  it 
has  reached  has  by  a  law  of  our  nature  the  same 
command  over  our  assent  as  our  senses  have,  170; 
vide  Proof;  mere  argument  is  not  the  measure  of 
assent,  197  (vide  Logic,  and  Assent)  ;  to  fear  argu- 
ment is  to  doubt  the  conclusion,  203. 

Argumentation,  w^hich  is  the  preliminary  to  Certi- 
tude, is  not  easily  discarded  after  it  has  done  its 
work;  questioning,  w^hen  encouraged  on  any  sub- 
ject-matter, readily  becomes  a  habit,  and  leads  the 
mind  to  substitute  exercises  of  inference  for  assent, 


8  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Argumentation:  continued. 
whether  simple  or  complex,  217  (vide  Introspec- 
tion). 

Arian  heresy,  142. 

Arians,  144,  151. 

Aries,  376. 

Aristotle,  263,  266,  338,  353,  354,  355;  quoted,  341; 
on  the  special  preparation  of  mind  required  for  each 
separate  department  of  inquiry  and  discussion, 
414-15. 

Arithmetic,  —  vide  Numeration;  265,  266. 

Arius,  142,  143. 

Arts,  Fine,  —  vide  Fine  Arts. 

"As  many  as  were  ordained  to  life  everlasting,  be- 
lieved," 415. 

Ascension,  139. 

Asia,  472,  484. 

Assent:  5-8;  assent  is  the  absolute,  unconditional 
acceptance  of  a  proposition,  8,  13,  16,  35,  38,  75, 
157,  172-4,  188,  189,  259;  it  is  a  mental  assertion, 
13,  188;  vide  Proposition;  notional  assent,  —  vide 
Notional  Assent;  real  assent,  —  vide  Real  As- 
sent; assent  to  theology,  —  vide  Theology;  assent 
to  religion,  —  vide  Religion,  and  Indefectibility; 
when  we  assent  to  a  proposition,  we  consider  it  for 
its  own  sake  and  in  its  intrinsic  sense,  13  (vide 
Assent  and  Inference,  and  Apprehension);  the 
keenness  of  an  assent  is  proportioned  to  the  strength 
of  the  apprehension  which  accompanies  it,  17,  19, 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  9 

Assent:  continued. 

35,  37;  assent  does  not  admit  of  degrees,  35,  38, 
172-4  (vide  Assent  and  Inference);  an  assent  is 
not  therefore  notional,  because  it  is  common  to  a 
number  of  individuals,  86  (vide  Individual);  as 
apprehension  is  a  concomitant,  so  inference  is  ordi- 
narily the  antecedent  of  assent;  but  neither  inter- 
feres with  the  unconditional  character  of  the  assent, 
viewed  in  itself,  157;  the  a  priori  method  of  regard- 
ing assent  in  its  relation  to  inference  condemns  an 
unconditional  assent  in  concrete  matters  on  what 
may  be  called  the  nature  of  the  case,  159-60;  this 
theory  is  contradicted  by  the  common  voice  of  man- 
kind; for  there  are  many  truths  in  concrete  matter, 
which  no  one  can  demonstrate,  yet  every  one  uncon- 
ditionally accepts,  160  (vide  Locke);  assent  is  an 
act  of  the  mind  intrinsically  distinct  from  inference, 
165-72;  for  we  know  from  experience  that  it  may 
endure  without  the  presence  of  the  inferential  acts 
upon  which  it  was  originally  elicited;  as  when  we  still 
assent,  though  we  have  forgotten  what  the  warrant 
was,  167;  and  sometimes  it  fails  while  the  reasons 
for  it  and  the  inferential  act  which  is  the  recognition 
of  those  reasons,  are  still  present,  and  in  force,  167-8 
(vide  Mind);  and  sometimes,  in  spite  of  strong  and 
convincing  arguments,  it  is  never  given,  168-9  (vide 
Prejudice,  and  Ratiocinative  Faculty);  and 
there  are  numerous  cases,  in  which  good  arguments, 
and   confessed  by  us  to  be  good,  are  not  strong 


10  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Assent:  continued. 

enough  to  incline  our  minds  ever  so  little  to  the 
conclusion  at  which  they  point;  the  proof  is  capable 
of  growth,  but  the  assent  either  exists  or  does  not 
exist,  169;  again,  argument  is  not  always  able  to 
command  our  assent,  even  though  it  be  demon- 
strative; as  in  long  and  intricate  mathematical 
investigations,  170-1;  the  inclination  to  give  assent 
is  greater  or  less  according  as  the  particular  act  of 
inference  expresses  a  stronger  or  weaker  probability, 
171;  assent  always  implies  grounds  in  reason,  im- 
plicit, if  not  explicit,  and  cannot  be  rightly  given 
without  sufficient  grounds,  171;  if  assent  is  the  ac- 
ceptance of  truth,  and  truth  is  the  proper  object  of 
the  intellect,  and  no  one  can  hold  conditionally  what 
by  the  same  act  he  holds  to  be  true,  here  too  is  a 
reason  for  saying  that  assent  is  an  adhesion  without 
reserve  or  doubt  to  the  proposition  to  which  it  is 
given,  172;  in  teaching  various  degrees  of  assent, 
we  tend  to  destroy  assent,  as  an  act  of  the  mind, 
altogether,  174;  there  are  no  variations  of  assent  to 
an  inference,  but  there  may  be  assents  to  a  varia- 
tion in  inferences,  175  (vide  Opinion);  assent  is 
indivisible,  since  its  object  is  indivisible,  175,  176 
(vide  Half- Assent,  and  Half-Truth);  instances 
of  assent  to  intuitive  truths,  177;  instances  of  assent 
to  truths  which  are  not  intuitive,  177-8;  assent  on 
reasonings  not  demonstrative  is  too  widely  recog- 
nized an  act  to  be  irrational,  unless  man's  nature  is 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  11 

Assent:  continued. 

irrational,  too  familiar  to  the  prudent  and  clear- 
minded  to  be  an  infirmity  or  an  extravagance,  179 
(vide  Act);  they  who  maintain  that  there  are  de- 
grees of  assent  confuse  together  a  mental  state  or 
act  and  a  scientific  rule,  an  interior  assent  and  a  set 
of  logical  formulas;  for  degrees  belong,  not  to  the 
position  of  the  mind  itself  relative  to  the  adoption 
of  a  given  conclusion,  but  to  the  relation  of  that 
conclusion  towards  its  premisses;  and  logic  is  as  little 
the  measure  of  our  assents,  as  the  graduated  scale 
of  a  thermometer  is  the  measure  of  the  refreshment 
we  receive  from  the  open  air,  179-80  (vide  Mind, 
and  Proof);  assent  upon  the  authority  of  others  is 
often  little  more  than  a  profession  or  acquiescence 
or  inference,  181-2  (vide  Profession);  vide  Prima 
Facie  Assent,  Conditional  Assent,  Deliberate 
Assent,  and  Hesitating  Assent;  habits  of  mind 
may  grow,  as  being  a  something  permanent  and 
continuous;  and  by  assent  growing,  it  is  often  only 
meant  that  the  habit  grows  and  has  greater  hold 
upon  the  mind,  185;  the  increase  or  decrease  of 
strength  does  not  lie  in  the  assent  itself,  but  in  its 
circumstances  and  concomitants;  for  instance,  in 
the  emotions,  in  the  ratiocinative  faculty,  or  in  the 
imagination,  185-6  (vide  Affections,  and  Imagina- 
tion); vide  Faith;  in  many  cases  assent  is  exercised 
unconsciously,  188;  a  great  many  of  our  assents  are 
merely  expressions  of  our  personal  likings,  tastes, 


12  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Assent:  continued. 

principles,  motives,  and  opinions,  as  dictated  by 
nature,  or  resulting  from  habit;  i.e.,  they  are  acts 
and  manifestations  of  self,  and  self-knowledge  is 
very  rare,  188;  in  proportion  to  our  ignorance  of 
self,  is  our  unconsciousness  of  those  innumerable 
acts  of  assent,  which  we  are  incessantly  making, 
188;  that  mode  of  assent  which  is  exercised  uncon- 
sciously is  simple  assent;  and  those  assents  which 
must  be  made  consciously  and  deliberately  are  com- 
plex or  reflex  assents,  189;  vide  Inference;  there  is 
no  necessary  incompatibility  between  assenting  and 
yet  proving,  —  for  the  conclusiveness  of  a  proposi- 
tion is  not  synonymous  with  its  truth;  besides,  we 
have  to  set  about  concluding  a  proposition,  when 
we  take  on  ourselves  to  convince  another  on  any 
point  in  which  he  differs  from  us ;  and  we  may  prove 
what  we  already  believe  to  be  true,  simply  in  order 
to  ascertain  the  producible  evidence  in  its  favour, 
190-1;  inquiry  is  inconsistent  with  assent,  but  in- 
vestigation is  not,  191-2  (vide  Investigation,  and 
Inquiry);  vide  Prejudices,  and  Objections;  an 
assent  which  is  made,  not  only  to  a  given  proposi- 
tion, but  to  the  claim  of  that  proposition  on  our 
assent  as  true,  is  commonly  called  a  conviction,  195 
(vide  Conviction);  reflex  acts  of  assent  may  be 
repeated  in  a  series,  195  (vide  Mind)  ;  let  the  proposi- 
tion to  which  the  assent  is  given  be  as  absolutely 
true  as  the  reflex  act  pronounces  it  to  be,  that  is, 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  13 

Assent:  continued. 

objectively  true  as  well  as  subjectively,  then  the 
assent  may  be  called  a  perception,  and  to  assent  to 
the  proposition  is  to  know,  195-6;  vide  Certitude; 
it  is  assent,  pure  and  simple,  which  is  the  motive 
cause  of  great  achievements,  216  (vide  Real  As- 
sent) ;  assent  is  an  act  of  the  mind,  congenial  to  its 
nature;  it  is  a  free  act,  a  personal  act  for  which  the 
doer  is  responsible,  and  the  actual  mistakes  in  mak- 
ing it,  be  they  ever  so  numerous  and  serious,  have 
no  force  whatever  to  prohibit  the  act  itself,  232 
(vide  Act);  in  making  an  assent  to  a  number  of 
propositions  all  together,  we  run  the  risk  of  putting 
upon  one  level,  and  treating  as  if  of  the  same  value, 
acts  of  the  mind  which  are  very  different  from  each 
other,  243;  inference  and  assent  are  the  immediate 
instruments  of  the  acquisition  of  knowledge,  349. 

Assent,  Notional  and  Real:  the  two  modes  of  ap- 
prehending do  not  in  any  way  affect  the  nature  of 
assent  itself;  but  they  give  it  an  external  character 
corresponding  respectively  to  their  own,  35  (vide 
Apprehension,  Notional  and  Real);  real  assent 
is  keener  than  notional,  17,  19,  35,  75,  89;  images, 
when  assented-to,  have  an  influence  both  on  the 
individual  and  on  society,  which  mere  notions  can- 
not exert,  75,  88;  instances  of  the  change  of  notional 
assent  into  real,  75-80  (vide  Action  of  Life, 
National  Defences,  Slave-Trade,  Duelling, 
Classics,  and  Scripture);   real   assents  are  of   a 


14  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OP 

Assent,  Notional  and  Real:  continued. 

personal  character,  each  individual  having  his  own 
and  being  known  by  them;  whereas  all  of  us  have 
the  power  of  abstraction,  and  can  be  taught  either 
to  make  or  to  enter  into  the  same  abstractions;  we 
cannot  make  sure,  for  ourselves  or  others,  of  real 
apprehension  and  assent,  because  we  have  to  secure 
first  the  images  which  are  their  objects,  and  these 
are  often  peculiar  and  special,  83  (vide  Real  As- 
sent). 

Assent  and  Inference:  assent  is  unconditional,  in- 
ference is  conditional ;  we  cannot  assent  to  a  proposi- 
tion, without  some  intelligent  apprehension  of  it, 
whereas  we  need  not  understand  it  at  all  in  order  to 
infer  it,  8,  13,  90;  vide  Proposition;  when  we  infer, 
we  consider  a  proposition  in  relation  to  other  propo- 
sitions; when  we  assent  to  it,  we  consider  it  for  its 
own  sake  and  in  its  intrinsic  sense,  13;  inferences 
are  especially  cognate  to  notional  apprehension 
and  assents  to  real,  12,  214;  assent  is  in  its  nature 
simply  one  and  indivisible,  and  inference  is  ever 
varying  in  strength,  38;  it  may  be  difficult  in  fact, 
by  external  tokens,  to  distinguish  given  acts  of 
assent  from  given  acts  of  inference,  38;  resemblance 
exists  only  in  cases  of  notional  assents,  39  (vide 
Inference  and  Notional  Assent)  ;  it  is  the  normal 
state  of  inference  to  apprehend  propositions  as 
notions,  and  of  assent  to  apprehend  propositions 
as  things,  40;  an  act  of  inference  includes  in  its 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  15 

Assent  and  Inference:  continued. 
object  the  dependence  of  its  thesis  upon  its  prem- 
isses, that  is,  upon  a  relation,  which  is  an  abstrac- 
tion; but  an  act  of  assent  rests  wholly  on  the  thesis 
as  its  object,  and  the  reality  of  the  thesis  is  almost 
a  condition  of  its  unconditionality,  40;  when  in- 
ferences are  exercised  on  things,  they  tend  to  be 
conjectures  or  presentiments,  without  logical  force; 
and  when  assents  are  exercised  on  notions,  they 
tend  to  be  mere  assertions,  without  any  personal 
hold  on  them  on  the  part  of  those  who  make  them, 
40  (vide  Mere  Assertion);  when  inference  is  clear- 
est, assent  may  be  least  forcible,  and,  when  assent 
is  most  intense,  inference  may  be  least  distinct;  for, 
though  acts  of  assent  require  previous  acts  of  in- 
ference, they  require  them,  not  as  adequate  causes, 
but  as  sine  qua  non  conditions;  and  while  the  appre- 
hension strengthens  assent,  inference  often  weakens 
the  apprehension,  41;  the  same  elementary  facts 
which  create  an  object  for  an  assent,  also  furnish 
matter  for  an  inference,  99;  the  object  of  assent  is  a 
truth,  the  object  of  inference  is  the  truth-like  or  a 
verisimilitude,  259. 

Assertion:  an  assertion  is  a  categorical  proposition, 
3;  vide  Proposition;  it  is  the  expression  of  an  assent, 
5;  a  mental  assertion  is  an  assent,  13,  188;  mere 
assertion,  —  vide  Mere  Assertion. 

Assumptions:  vide  Presumption;  the  first  elements 
of  thought  in  all  reasoning  are  assumptions;  they 


16  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Assumptions  :  continued. 

are  our  principles,  tastes,  and  opinions,  which  are 
very  often  of  a  personal  character,  and  are  half  the 
battle  in  the  inference  with  which  the  reasoning  is 
to  terminate,  361 ;  the  implicit  assumption  of  definite 
propositions  and  the  arbitrary  exclusion  of  others, 
of  whatever  kind,  have  a  place  in  the  first  start  of 
a  course  of  reasoning;  unless  we  had  the  right,  when 
we  pleased,  of  ruling  that  propositions  were  irrele- 
vant or  absurd,  we  could  not  conduct  an  argument 
at  all,  375-6;  instances  of  assumptions:  (1)  there 
are  writers  who  lay  down  as  a  general  proposition 
that  we  have  no  right  in  philosophy  to  make  any 
assumptions  whatever,  and  that  we  ought  to  begin 
with  a  universal  doubt,  377  (vide  Doubt)  ;  (2)  an  ar- 
gument has  often  been  put  forward  by  unbelievers 
to  this  effect,  that  "  a  revelation,  which  is  to  be  re- 
ceived as  true,  ought  to  be  written  on  the  sun,"  378 
(vide  Revelation)  ;  (3)  another  conflict  of  assump- 
tions relates  to  the  end  and  scope  of  civil  society, 
that  is,  whether  government  and  legislation  ought 
to  be  of  a  religious  character,  or  not,  379  (vide 
Government);  (4)  another  great  conflict  of  first 
principles  has  to  do  with  the  Rule  of  Faith,  Protes- 
tants maintaining  that  it  is  Scripture,  379-81  (vide 
Rule  op  Faith). 

Astronomy,  318,  319,  320. 

"At  the  end  of  the  world  the  Angels  shall  go  forth," 
etc.,  455. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  17 

Athanasian  Creed:  the  formula,  "Tres  et  Unus,"  is 
the  key-note  of  the  Athanasian  Creed,  125;  132;  it 
has  sometimes  been  called  the  "Psalmus  Qui- 
cunque/'  133;  it  is  the  most  simple  and  sublime,  the 
most  devotional  formulary  to  which  Christianity 
has  given  birth,  133;  the  antithetical  form  of  its 
sentences  is  intended  as  a  check  upon  our  reasonings 
lest  they  rush  on  in  one  direction  beyond  the  limits 
of  the  truth,  133;  134,  140-1,  246. 

Athanasius,  St.,  140. 

Atheism:  241;  the  alternative  intellectually  between 
Atheism  and  Catholicity,  495-501. 

Atheist,  247. 

Athenagoras:  quoted,  469. 

Athens,  388,  423. 

Atonement:  atonement  is  "a  substitution  of  some- 
thing offered,  or  some  personal  suffering,  for  a 
penalty  which  would  otherwise  be  exacted,"  392-3; 
the  practice  of  atonement  is  remarkable  for  its 
antiquity  and  universality,  393;  the  doctrine  of 
atonement  is  not  inconsistent  with  the  teachings  of 
conscience;  when  the  time  comes,  which  conscience 
forebodes,  of  our  being  called  to  judgment,  we  shall 
have  to  stand  in  and  by  ourselves,  and  must  bear 
our  own  burden,  394-5;  but  among  the  media  by 
which  we  are  prepared  for  that  judgment  are  the 
exertions  and  pains  taken  in  our  behalf  by  others, 
405  (vide  Natural  Religion);  on  this  vicarious 
principle,    by   which   we   appropriate   to    ourselves 


18  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Atonement:  continued. 

what  others  do  for  us,  the  whole  structure  of  society- 
is  raised,  405;  illustrations  of  this,  405-6;  Butler's 
answer  to  the  objection  that  the  Christian  doctrine 
of  satisfaction  "represents  God  as  indifferent  whether 
He  punishes  the  innocent  or  the  guilty,"  406-7;  he 
who  undergoes  the  punishment  of  another  in  his 
stead  may  be  said  in  a  certain  sense  to  satisfy  the 
claims  of  justice  towards  that  other  in  his  own  per- 
son, 407  (vide  Punishment)  ;  in  all  atonements  and 
satisfactions,  not  only  was  the  innocent  taken  for 
the  guilty,  but  it  was  a  point  of  special  importance 
that  the  victim  should  be  spotless,  407. 

"Audi  alteram  partem,"  421. 

Augustine,  St.,  134;  St.  Augustine's  doctrine  of  pre- 
destination and  the  tenet  of  Calvin  upon  it  really 
differ  from  each  other  toto  ccelo  in  significance  and 
effect,  251. 

Augustus,  10. 

"  Auld  lang  syne,"  28. 

Austerlitz,  339. 

Australia,  453. 

Austria,  304. 

Auto-anthropos,  280,  281. 

Autun,  Symphorian  of,  482. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  19 

B 

Baal,  404. 

Bacon:  350,  351,  361;  Bacon,  having  it  in  view  to 
extend  our  power  over  nature,  took  firm  hold  of  the 
idea  of  causation  (in  the  common  sense  of  the  word) 
as  contrasted  with  that  of  design,  refusing  to  mix 
up  the  two  ideas  in  one  inquiry;  in  this  achievement 
of  intellect,  which  has  been  so  fruitful  in  results,  lie 
his  genius  and  his  fame,  372. 

Balaam  had  light  without  love,  185. 

Baptist,  St.  John,  449. 

Barulas,  483-4. 

Battle:  even  the  bravest  men  experience  a  beating  of 
the  heart  and  a  trembling  of  the  limbs  before  a 
battle,  when  standing  still  to  receive  the  first  attack 
of  the  enemy,  203. 

"  Be  His  witnesses  to  the  end  of  the  earth,"  451. 

"Bear  one  another's  burdens,"  405. 

Beautiful:  the  sense  of  the  beautiful  or  taste,  is 
attended  by  an  intellectual  enjoyment,  and  is  free 
from  whatever  is  of  the  nature  of  emotion,  except 
in  one  case,  viz.,  when  it  is  excited  by  personal 
objects;  then  it  is  that  the  tranquil  feeling  of  ad- 
miration is  exchanged  for  the  excitement  of  affec- 
tion and  passion,  109,  107  (vide  Conscience). 

Bi:autifulness  :  when  we  have  been  affected  by  a 
certain  specific  admiring  pleasure  at  the  sight  of  this 
or  that  concrete  object,  we  proceed  by  an  arbitrary 


20  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Beautifulness  :  continued. 
act  of  the  mind  to  give  a  name  to  the  hypothetical 
cause  or  quality  in  the  abstract,  which  excites  it; 
we  speak  of  it  as  beautifulness,  and  henceforth, 
when  we  call  a  thing  beautiful,  we  mean  by  the 
word  a  certain  quality  of  things  which  creates  in  us 
this  special  sensation,  64-5. 

"Before  the  sun  and  the  light  and  the  moon  and  the 
stars  be  darkened,"  etc.,  123. 

"Began  to  strike  his  fellow-servants,"  etc.,  456. 

"  Behold,  a  king  shall  reign  in  justice,"  etc.,  454. 

"  Behold,  I  send  you  as  sheep  in  the  midst  of  wolves," 
452. 

Being:  one's  own  being,  —  vide  Self;  every  being  is 
in  a  true  sense  sufficient  for  itself,  so  as  to  be  able 
to  fulfil  its  particular  needs;  it  is  a  general  law  that, 
whatever  is  found  as  a  function  or  an  attribute  of 
any  class  of  beings,  or  is  natural  to  it,  is  in  its  sub- 
stance suitable  to  it,  and  subserves  its  existence, 
and  cannot  be  rightly  regarded  as  a  fault  or  enor- 
mity; there  is  a  principle  of  vitality  in  every  being, 
which  is  of  a  sanative  and  restorative  character; 
thus  brutes,  after  all  exceptions,  may  be  said  each 
of  them  to  have,  after  its  own  kind,  a  perfection  of 
nature,  348  (vide  Man). 

Belgium,  304. 

Belief:  belief  in  one  God,  —  vide  Conscience;  real 
assents  are  sometimes  called  beliefs,  87,  89;  the 
belief  of  so  many  thousands  in  the  Divinity  of  our 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  21 

Belief:  continued. 
Lord  is  not  therefore  notional,  because  it  is  common, 
but  may  be  a  real  and  personal  belief,  being  pro- 
duced in  different  individual  minds  by  various 
experiences  and  disposing  causes,  variously  com- 
bined, 86-7;  virtual,  interpretative,  or  prospective 
belief  is  called  a  believing  implicite,  152;  belief  in 
the  Holy  Trinity,  —  vide  Holy  Trinity;  belief  in 
dogmatic  theology,  —  vide  Dogmatic  Theology; 
my  vague  consciousness  of  the  possibility  of  a  re- 
versal of  my  belief  in  the  course  of  my  researches 
does  not  interfere  with  the  honesty  and  firmness  of 
that  belief  while  those  researches  proceed,  193; 
belief  implies,  not  an  intention  never  to  change, 
but  the  utter  absence  of  all  thought,  or  expectation, 
or  fear  of  changing,  193;  vide  Revealed  Religion. 

Benedict  XIV,  Pope,  411. 

Benthamism,  92. 

Beveridge,  56. 

Bible,  —  vide  Scripture. 

"Bible  Religion"  is  both  the  recognized  title  and 
the  best  description  of  English  religion,  56  (vide 
England,  Church  of). 

Billion:  a  real  or  notional  apprehension  of  a  billion 
or  a  trillion,  in  itself,  is  impossible,  45. 

Birmingham,  64. 

Birth:  an  ordinary  individual,  as  one  of  ourselves, 
cannot  bring  into  one  focus  of  proof  the  reasons 
which  make  him  sure  that  he  was  born,  301. 


22  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

BiTHYNIA,  470. 

Blandina:  481;  her  words  quoted,  482. 

"Blessed  are  they  that  suffer  persecution/'  452. 

"  Blessed  are  ye  when  they  revile  you/'  452. 

Blessed  Virgin,  57. 

BoNosus,  St.,  477. 

Britain,  393. 

Brougham,  Lord,  91,  96. 

Brutes,  —  vide  Instinct,  External  World,  and 
Man. 

Buddhism,  149. 

Butler:  59,  344,  361,  378,  382,  493,  496,  497;  quoted, 
321;  on  the  proof  of  Revelation,  319;  he  is  the  great 
master  of  the  doctrine  of  Atonement,  as  it  is  brought 
out  in  the  system  of  nature;  his  words  quoted  in 
answer  to  an  objection  to  the  Christian  doctrine 
of  satisfaction,  406-7. 

c 

C^ciLius:  quoted,  468. 

C^sar:  27,  28,  186,  212,  480;  words  of  Napoleon  on 
Caesar,  490. 

C^sarea,  484. 

Calculating  Boys:  they  seem  to  have  certain  short- 
cuts to  conclusions,  which  they  cannot  explain  to 
themselves,  333;  it  is  said  that  to  teach  them  the 
ordinary  rules  of  arithmetic  is  to  endanger  or  to 
destroy  the  extraordinary  endowment,  336. 

Caliban,  47. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  23 

Callings,  —  vide  Professions. 

Callista,  Newman's,  400  note. 

Calvin:  245;  vide  Augustine,  St. 

Calvinist,  251. 

Canaanites,  442  note. 

Categorical  proposition,  —  vide  Proposition. 

Catholics  are  not  allowed  to  inquire  into  the  truth 
of  their  Creed,  191;  vide  Church;  calumnies  directed 
against  Catholics,  254. 

Causation:  belief  in  causation  is  a  first  principle,  66; 
the  assent  which  we  give  to  the  proposition,  as  a 
first  principle,  that  nothing  happens  without  a 
cause,  is  derived,  in  the  first  instance,  from  our 
consciousness  of  willing  and  doing,  66,  68;  the  notion 
of  causation  is  one  of  the  first  lessons  which  we  learn 
from  experience,  that  experience  limiting  it  to 
agents  possessed  of  intelligence  and  will,  66;  it  is 
the  notion  of  power  combined  with  a  purpose  and 
an  end,  66;  wherever  the  world  is  young,  the  move- 
ments and  changes  of  physical  nature  have  been 
and  are  spontaneously  ascribed  by  its  people  to  the 
presence  and  will  of  hidden  agents,  66;  when  we 
witness  invariable  antecedents  and  consequents, 
we  call  the  former  the  cause  of  the  latter,  though 
intelligence  is  absent,  from  the  analogy  of  external 
appearances,  67;  at  length  we  go  on  to  confuse 
causation  with  order;  and  we  call  the  ultimate 
points  of  an  analysis  of  a  complicated  assemblage 
of  phenomena  and  the  hypothetical  facts  in  which 


24  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Causation:  continued. 

the  whole  mass  of  phenomena  is  gathered  up, 
by  the  name  of  causes,  whereas  they  are  really 
only  the  formula  under  which  those  phenomena  are 
conveniently  represented,  67;  this  illustrated  in  the 
case  of  the  formula,  "The  king  can  do  no  wrong," 
67;  the  doctrine  of  causation  is  the  first  principle 
that  all  things  come  of  effective  will,  68  (vide 
Cause). 

Cause:  the  word  "cause"  has  two  senses,  viz.,  that 
which  brings  a  thing  to  be,  and  that  on  which  a 
thing  under  given  circumstances  follows;  the  former 
sense  is  that  of  which  our  experience  is  the  earlier 
and  more  intimate;  the  latter  requires  a  discrimina- 
tion and  exactness  of  thought  for  its  apprehension, 
which  implies  special  mental  training,  68;  starting 
from  experience,  cause  is  to  be  considered  an  effective 
will,  68;  we  have  no  experience  of  any  cause  but 
Will,  72. 

Cecil,  56. 

Celsus:  486;  quoted,  468,  477. 

Certain:  those  propositions  are  certain  which  are  such 
that  I  am  certain  of  them,  344;  reason  never  bids 
us  be  certain  except  on  an  absolute  proof,  345  (vide 
Proof). 

Certainty:  let  the  proposition  to  which  the  assent  is 
given  be  as  absolutely  true  as  the  reflex  act  pro- 
nounces it  to  be,  that  is,  objectively  true  as  well  as 
subjectively,  then  the  proposition  may  be  called  a 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  25 

Certainty:  continued. 

certainty,  195-6;  certainty  is  a  quality  of  proposi- 
tions, 344;  certainty,  in  order  to  be  certainty,  must 
endure,  242;  the  certainty  of  a  proposition  does  not 
properly  consist  in  the  certitude  of  the  mind  which 
contemplates  it,  293. 

Certitude:  let  the  proposition  to  which  the  assent  is 
given  be  as  absolutely  true  as  the  reflex  act  pro- 
nounces it  to  be,  that  is,  objectively  true  as  well  as 
subjectively,  then  the  conviction  may  be  called  a  cer- 
titude, 195-6,  197,  221  (vide  Conviction);  certitude 
is  a  mental  state,  344  (vide  Certainty);  among 
fairly  prudent  and  circumspect  men  there  are  far 
fewer  instances  of  false  certitude  than  at  first  sight 
might  be  supposed,  196;  it  is  a  main  characteristic 
of  certitude  in  any  matter,  to  be  confident  indeed 
that  that  certitude  will  last,  but  to  be  confident  of 
this  also,  that,  if  it  did  fail,  the  thing  itself  of  which 
we  are  certain,  will  remain  just  as  it  is,  true  and 
irreversible,  197-200;  no  man  is  certain  of  a  truth, 
who  can  endure  the  thought  of  the  fact  of  its  con- 
tradictory existing  or  occurring,  197-8;  instances 
of  an  adherence  to  propositions,  which  does  not 
fulfil  the  conditions  of  certitude,  200-2;  those  who 
are  certain  of  a  fact  are  indolent  disputants,  201; 
mere  assent  is  not  certitude,  and  must  not  be  con- 
fused with  it,  203;  certitude  is  accompanied  by 
a  specific  feeling  of  satisfaction  and  intellectual 
security,  proper  to  it,  as  its  token,  and  in  a  certain 


26  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Certitude:  continued. 

sense  its  form,  203-4;  this  satisfaction  does  not 
attend  on  simple  assent,  or  on  processes  of  inference, 
or  on  doubt,  or  on  investigation,  or  on  any  other 
state  or  action  of  mind,  besides  certitude,  204-9 
(vide  Knowledge,  Search,  and  Doubt);  popularly 
no  distinction  is  made  between  assent  and  certitude, 
210;  great  numbers  of  men  pass  through  life  with 
neither  doubt  nor  certitude  on  the  most  important 
propositions  which  can  occupy  their  minds,  but 
with  only  a  simple  assent,  210-11;  such  is  the  state 
of  mind  of  religious  Protestants  and  of  multitudes 
of  good  Catholics,  211;  the  simple  assent  of  these 
people  may  be  called  material,  or  interpretative,  or 
virtual  certitude,  211-12  (vide  Material  Certi- 
tude) ;  a  simple  assent  need  not  be  notional,  but  the 
reflex  or  confirmatory  assent  of  certitude  always  is 
given  to  a  notional  proposition,  viz.,  to  the  truth, 
necessity,  duty,  etc.,  of  our  assent  to  the  simple 
assent  and  to  its  proposition,  214;  assent  to  a  real 
proposition  is  more  emphatic  and  operative  than 
the  confirmatory  assent  of  certitude;  the  confirma- 
tion gives  momentum  to  the  complex  act  of  the 
mind,  but  the  simple  assent  gives  it  its  edge, 
214  (vide  Real  Assent,  and  Assent,  Notional 
AND  Real)  ;  this  illustrated  in  the  case  of  the  propo- 
sition, "The  cholera  is  in  the  midst  of  us,"  and  in 
the  case  of  the  Martyrs  as  contrasted  with  literary 
and  scientific  men,  214-16;  the  reflex  assent  of  cer- 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  27 

Certitude:  continued. 
titude,  taken  by  itself,  has  scarcely  more  force  than 
the  recording  of  a  conclusion,  215;  argumentation 
which  is  the  preliminary  to  certitude,  is  not  easily 
discarded  after  it  has  done  its  work,  217  (vide  Intro- 
spection, and  Argumentation);  assents  may  and 
do  change;  certitudes  endure,  220;  certitude  is  essen- 
tial to  the  Christian,  220  (vide  Religion)  ;  certitude 
in  any  matter  is  the  termination  of  all  doubt  or  fear 
about  its  truth,  and  an  unconditional  conscious 
adherence  to  it,  and  therefore  carries  with  it  an 
inward  assurance,  strong  though  implicit,  that  it 
shall  never  fail;  indefectibility  almost  enters  into 
its  very  idea,  221;  statement  of  the  case  against  the 
indefectibility  of  certitude,  222-4  (vide  Indefecti- 
bility); distinction  between  infallibility  and  cer- 
titude, 224-7  (vide  Infallibility);  certitude  is  a 
deliberate  assent  given  expressly  after  reasoning, 
229,  258,  345;  if  then  my  certitude  is  unfounded,  it 
is  the  reasoning  that  is  in  fault,  not  my  assent  to  it, 
229;  vide  Re-Consideration;  a  second  certitude  is 
not  prohibited  by  the  failure  of  the  first,  231,  232 
(vide  Error);  false  certitudes  are  faults  because 
they  are  false,  not  because  they  are  (supposed) 
certitudes;  they  are,  or  may  be,  the  attempts  and 
the  failures  of  an  intellect  insufficiently  trained,  or 
off  its  guard,  232  (vide  Act,  Assent,  and  Mind);  no 
instances  whatever  of  mistaken  certitude  are  suffi- 
cient to  constitute  a  proof  that  certitude  itself  is  a 


28  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Certitude:  continued. 

perversion  or  extravagance  of  man's  nature,  233; 
this  illustrated  by  the  instance  of  a  clock  and  of  our 
conscience,  233-4;  the  sense  of  certitude  is  the  clear 
witness  to  what  is  true,  233;  as  a  human  being,  I 
am  unable,  if  I  were  to  try,  to  live  without  those 
landmarks  of  thought  which  certitude  secures  for 
me,  234;  the  multitude  of  men  confuse  together  the 
probable,  the  possible,  and  the  certain,  and  make 
little  distinction  between  credence,  opinion,  and 
profession;  at  various  times  they  give  them  all  per- 
haps the  name  of  certitude,  and  accordingly,  when 
they  change  their  minds,  they  fancy  they  have  given 
up  points  of  which  they  had  a  true  conviction,  and 
the  very  idea  of  certitude  falls  into  disrepute,  234-5; 
we  are  sometimes  unfairly  said  to  have  changed 
our  certitudes,  when  we  have  merely  revised  or 
repudiated  our  conclusions  upon  the  hundred  mat- 
ters which  come  before  us  every  day  and  on  which 
we  have  but  little  right  to  speak  at  all,  235;  some- 
times, again,  the  absurdities  and  excesses  of  the 
rude  intellect  are  set  down  as  instances  of  certitude 
and  of  its  failure,  235-6;  no  act  or  state  of  the 
intellect  is  certitude,  which  does  not  follow  upon 
examination  and  proof,  236;  the  occasions  or  sub- 
ject-matters of  certitude  are  under  law  also;  putting 
aside  the  daily  exercise  of  the  senses,  the  principal 
subjects  in  secular  knowledge,  about  which  we  can 
be  certain,  are  the  truths  or  facts  which  are  its 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  29 

Certitude:  continued. 
basis;  beyond  these  lies  a  vast  subject-matter  of 
opinion,  credence,  and  belief,  236-7,  239;  vide 
Probability,  and  Religion;  the  first  principles 
and  elements  of  religion  are  certain,  237,  239;  Chris- 
tian earnestness,  as  long  as  it  exists,  will  presuppose 
certitude  as  the  very  life  which  is  to  animate  it, 
239;  the  primary  principles  of  religion  are  immutable, 
but  beyond  these  lies  the  large  domain  of  theology, 
metaphysics,  and  ethics,  on  which  it  is  not  allowed 
to  us  to  advance  beyond  probabilities,  or  to  attain 
to  more  than  an  opinion,  239-40;  vide  Indefecti- 
bility;  a  change  of  religion  does  not  imply  a  failure 
of  certitude,  243-55;  a  man  might  travel  in  his 
religious  profession  all  the  way  from  heathenism  to 
Catholicity,  without  any  one  certitude  lost,  251 
(vide  St.  Paul,  Jews,  Anglicans,  Christians,  and 
Philosophers);  certitude  does  not  admit  of  an 
interior,  immediate  test,  sufficient  to  discriminate 
it  from  false  certitude;  but  indefectibility  may  at 
least  serve  as  a  negative  test  of  it,  255-6  (vide 
Criterion,  and  Indefectibility);  there  are  three 
conditions  of  certitude:  (1)  it  follows  only  on  in- 
vestigation and  proof;  (2)  it  is  accompanied  by  a 
specific  sense  of  intellectual  satisfaction  and  repose, 
i.e.,  by  a  sense  of  finality;  (3)  it  is  irreversible;  if  the 
assent  is  made  without  rational  grounds,  it  is  a  rash 
judgment,  a  fancy,  or  a  prejudice;  if  without  the 
sense  of  finality,  it  is  scarcely  more  than  an  inference; 


30  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Certitude:  continued. 

if  without  permanence,  it  is  a  mere  conviction,  258; 
from  the  nature  of  the  case  and  from  the  constitu- 
tion of  the  human  mind,  certitude  in  concrete  mat- 
ters is  the  result  of  arguments  which,  taken  in  the 
letter,  and  not  in  their  full  implicit  sense,  are  but 
probabilities,  293  (vide  Probabilities);  many  of 
our  most  obstinate  and  most  reasonable  certitudes 
depend  on  proofs  which  are  informal  and  personal, 
which  baffle  our  powers  of  analysis,  and  cannot  be 
brought  under  logical  rule,  301 ;  the  recognition  of  a 
correlation  between  certitude  and  implicit  proof 
seems  to  be  a  law  of  our  minds,  301;  that  supra- 
logical  judgment,  which  is  the  warrant  for  our 
certitude  throughout  the  range  of  concrete  matter, 
is  not  mere  common  sense,  but  the  true  healthy 
action  of  our  ratiocinative  powers,  an  action  more 
subtle  and  comprehensive  than  the  mere  apprecia- 
tion of  a  syllogistic  argument,  317;  this  certitude 
and  this  evidence  are  often  called  moral,  318  (vide 
Moral  Certitude);  there  are  those  who,  arguing 
a  priori,  maintain,  that,  since  experience  leads  by 
syllogism^  only  to  probabilities,  certitude  is  ever  a 
mistake;  there  are  others  who,  in  order  to  vindicate 
the  certainty  of  our  knowledge,  have  recourse  to  the 
hypothesis  of  intuitions,  intellectual  forms  and  the 
like,  which  belong  to  us  by  nature,  and  may  be 
considered  to  elevate  our  experience  into  something 
more  than  it  is  in  itself,  343-4;  it  is  enough  to  appeal 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  31 

Certitude:  continued. 

to  the  common  voice  of  mankind  in  proof  of  the 
certainty  of  knowledge;  our  possession  of  certitude 
is  a  proof  that  it  is  not  a  weakness  or  an  absurdity 
to  be  certain,  344;  vide  Act,  and  Function;  certi- 
tude is  not  a  passive  impression  made  upon  the 
mind  from  without,  by  argumentative  compulsion, 
but  it  is  an  active  recognition  of  propositions  as 
true,  such  as  it  is  the  duty  of  each  individual  him- 
self to  exercise  at  the  bidding  of  reason,  and,  when 
reason  forbids,  to  withhold,  344-5;  vide  Criterion; 
there  is  no  science  of  reasoning  sufficient  to  compel 
certitude  in  concrete  conclusions,  350  (vide  Proof, 
and  Logic);  though  truth  is  ever  one  and  the  same, 
and  the  assent  of  certitude  is  immutable,  still  the 
reasonings  which  carry  us  on  to  truth  and  certitude 
are  many  and  distinct,  and  vary  with  the  inquirer, 
355. 

Character:  good  character  goes  far  in  destroying 
the  force  of  even  plausible  charges;  and  the  evidence 
in  support  of  an  allegation  must  be  singularly  strong 
to  overcome  an  established  antecedent  probability 
which  stands  opposed  to  it,  381. 

Character-Reading,  332-3. 

Charlemagne,  452. 

Children:  it  is  instinct  which  impels  the  child  to 
recognize  in  the  smiles  or  the  frowns  of  a  counte- 
nance which  meets  his  eyes,  not  only  a  being  external 
to  himself,  but  one  whose  looks  elicit  in  him  con- 


32  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS    OF 

Children:  continued. 

fidence  or  fear;  and  as  he  instinctively  interprets 
these  physical  phenomena,  as  tokens  of  things 
beyond  themselves,  so  from  the  sensations  attendant 
upon  certain  classes  of  his  thoughts  and  actions  he 
gains  a  perception  of  an  external  being,  who  reads 
his  mind,  to  whom  he  is  responsible,  who  praises 
and  blames,  who  promises  and  threatens,  62;  vide 
Conscience,  and  Instinct;  a  spontaneous  reception 
of  religious  truths  is  common  with  children;  the 
child  keenly  understands  that  there  is  a  difference 
between  right  and  wrong;  and  when  he  has  done 
what  he  believes  to  be  wrong,  he  is  conscious  that 
he  is  offending  One  to  whom  he  is  amenable,  whom 
he  does  not  see,  who  sees  him;  his  mind  reaches 
forward  with  a  strong  presentiment  to  the  thought 
of  a  Moral  Governor,  sovereign  over  him,  mindful 
and  just;  it  comes  to  him  like  an  impulse  of  nature 
to  entertain  it,  112. 

Chillingworth:  his  mistake  as  regards  the  distinc- 
tion between  infallibility  and  certitude,  226-7,  493. 

China,  215. 

Chinese,  376. 

Christ:  244,  449,  450,  et  at.;  the  Mediation  of  Christ 
is  the  central  doctrine  of  Revelation,  487. 

"Christ  in  him,  the  hope  of  glory,"  479-80. 

Christianity:  56;  vide  Revealed  Religion,  and 
Church;  certitude,  and  not  mere  probability,  is 
necessary  for  vital  Christianity,  238-9,  220;  Pascal 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  33 

Christianity  :  continued. 

quoted  on  the  establishment  of  Christianity,  307-8; 
the  facts  of  Christianity,  as  they  stand,  are  beyond 
what  is  possible  to  man,  and  betoken  the  presence 
of  a  higher  intelligence,  purpose,  and  might,  308; 
the  exhibition  of  credentials,  that  is,  of  evidence,  is 
essential  to  Christianity,  as  it  comes  to  us;  for  we 
must  receive  it  all,  as  we  find  it,  if  we  accept  it  at 
all,  387;  our  Lord  and  His  Apostles  always  treat 
Christianity  as  the  completion  and  supplement  of 
Natural  Religion,  and  of  previous  revelations,  388; 
Christianity  is  proved  in  the  Grammar  of  Assent 
by  the  argument  of  an  accumulation  of  various  prob- 
abilities, 411  (vide  Probabilities,  and  Concrete); 
Newman  addresses  his  proof  to  those  only  whose 
minds  are  properly  prepared  for  it;  and  by  being 
prepared,  he  means  to  denote  those  who  are  imbued 
with  the  religious  opinions  and  sentiments  which  he 
has  identified  with  Natural  Religion,  415-16;  he 
assumes  the  presence  of  God  in  our  conscience,  and 
the  universal  experience,  as  keen  as  our  experience 
of  bodily  pain,  of  what  we  call  a  sense  of  sin  or  guilt, 
417;  this  sense  of  sin  is  chiefly  felt  as  regards  viola- 
tions of  God's  Sanctity,  Truth,  and  Love;  and  the 
three  offences  against  His  Majesty  are  impurity, 
inveracity,  and  cruelty,  417;  specimens  of  the  state 
of  mind  for  which  Newman  stipulates  in  those  who 
would  inquire  into  the  truth  of  Christianity,  417-18, 
it  may  be  urged  that  no  appeal  will  avail,  which  is 


34  ^A^  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Christianity:  continued. 

made  to  religions  so  notoriously  immoral  as  those 
of  paganism;  but  there  is  a  better  side  of  their  teach- 
ing; purity  has  often  been  held  in  reverence,  if  not 
practised;  dishonesty  and  injustice  have  been  under 
a  ban,  etc.;  moreover,  the  religious  rites  and  tradi- 
tions which  are  actually  found  in  the  world  are 
here  used  only  so  far  as  they  agree  with  our  moral 
sense;  and  it  must  be  laid  down  that  no  religion  is 
from  God  which  contradicts  our  sense  of  right  and 
wrong,  418-19;  vide  Vengeance,  Providence, 
Eternity,  and  Revealed  Religion;  Paley's  Evi- 
dences of  Christianity,  —  vide  Paley;  a  man  is  not 
better  for  Christianity,  who  has  never  felt  the  need 
of  it  or  the  desire,  425  (vide  Conversion,  Truth, 
and  Conscientiousness)  ;  in  his  proof  of  Christianity 
Newman  only  insists  on  those  coincidences  and  their 
cumulations,  which,  though  not  in  themselves  mi- 
raculous, do  irresistibly  force  upon  us,  almost  by  the 
law  of  our  nature,  the  presence  of  the  extraordinary 
agency  of  Him  whose  being  we  already  acknowl- 
edge, 427,  429  (vide  Law);  illustrations  of  such 
coincidences  in  the  case  of  the  market-woman  being 
struck  dead  and  the  arms  falling  from  the  hands  of 
Napoleon's  soldiers,  428;  Christianity  is  the  only 
religion  in  the  world  which  tends  to  fulfil  the  aspira- 
tions, needs  and  fore-shadowings  of  natural  faith 
and  devotion;  so  that  if  it  does  not  come  from  God, 
a  revelation  is  not  yet  given,  429-30,  431;  Chris- 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  35 

Christianity:  continued. 

tianity  is  not  here  singled  out  with  reference  simply 
to  its  particular  doctrines  or  precepts,  but  because 
it  alone  has  a  definite  message  addressed  to  all  man- 
kind, 430;  thus  it  differs  from  the  religion  of  Mahomet 
and  the  religions  of  the  far  East,  430;  description 
of  Christianity,  430-1;  it  is  the  continuation  and 
conclusion  of  what  professes  to  be  an  earlier  revela- 
tion, which  may  be  traced  back  into  prehistoric 
times,  431,  437  (vide  Jews);  it  is  a  notorious  fact 
that  it  issued  from  the  Jewish  land  and  people;  it 
professes  to  be  the  legitimate  offspring,  heir,  and 
successor  of  the  Mosaic  covenant,  or  rather  to  be 
Judaism  itself,  developed  and  transformed,  437;  at 
the  very  time  that  the  Jews  committed  their  un- 
pardonable sin,  and  were  driven  out  from  their 
home,  their  Christian  brethren,  born  of  the  same 
stock,  also  issued  forth  from  the  same  home;  they 
undertook  the  very  work  which  their  nation  actually 
was  ordained  to  execute;  and,  with  a  method  of 
their  own  indeed,  and  with  a  new  end,  they  did  it; 
so  that,  the  fact  that  Christianity  actually  has  done 
what  Judaism  was  to  have  done,  decides  the  con- 
troversy in  favour  of  Christianity,  437-8;  Christians 
point  to  the  Messiah  as  coming  when  announced; 
they  are  not  met  by  any  counter  claim  or  rival  claim- 
ant on  the  part  of  the  Jews,  438;  Christianity  clears 
up  the  mystery  which  hangs  over  Judaism,  account- 
ing fully  for  the  punishment  of  the  people,  by  specify- 


36  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Christianity  :  continued. 

ing  their  heinous  sin,  the  crucifixion  of  their  Messiah; 
in  rejecting  their  Divine  King,  they  ipso  facto  lost 
the  living  principle  and  tie  of  their  nationality,  438; 
this  apparent  correspondence  between  Christianity 
and  Judaism  is  in  itself  a  presumption  for  such  cor- 
respondence being  real ;  and  if  the  history  of  Judaism 
is  so  wonderful  as  to  suggest  the  presence  of  some 
special  divine  agency  in  its  appointments  and  for- 
tunes, still  more  wonderful  and  divine  is  the  history 
of  Christianity;  and  it  is  more  wonderful  still,  that 
two  such  wonderful  creations  should  span  almost 
the  whole  course  of  ages,  439;  no  other  religion  but 
these  two  professes  to  be  the  organ  of  a  formal  revela- 
tion which  is  directed  to  the  benefit  of  the  whole 
human  race;  here  it  is  that  Mahometanism  fails, 
440  (vide  Mahometanism);  in  the  book  of  Genesis 
it  is  stated  with  the  utmost  precision  that  the  chosen 
people  was  set  up  in  this  one  idea,  viz.,  to  be  a  bless- 
ing to  the  whole  earth,  and  that,  by  means  of  one 
of  their  own  race,  a  greater  than  their  father  Abra- 
ham; at  the  very  time  of  Abraham's  call,  he  is  told 
of  it:  "I  will  make  of  thee  a  great  nation,  and  in 
thee  shall  all  the  tribes  of  the  earth  be  blessed"; 
and  this  promise  and  purpose  is  repeated  to  Isaac, 
Jacob,  and  Judah,  and  this  time  with  the  addition, 
"The  sceptre  shall  not  be  taken  away  from  Judah, 
until  He  come  for  whom  it  is  reserved,  and  He  shall 
be  the  expectation  of  the  nations,"  441-2;  from  the 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  37 

Christianity:  continued. 
heathen  historians,  Tacitus  and  Suetonius,  and  from 
the  Jew  Josephus,  it  is  clear  that  the  Jews  did  thus 
understand  their  prophecies,  and  did  expect  their 
great  Ruler,  in  the  very  age  in  which  our  Lord  came, 
and  in  which  they,  on  the  other  hand,w^ere  destroyed, 
443-4;  the  fact  that  at  that  very  time  our  Lord  did 
appear  as  a  teacher,  and  founded  not  merely  a 
religion,  but  a  system  of  religious  warfare,  an  ag- 
gressive and  militant  body,  a  dominant  Catholic 
Church,  which  aimed  at  and  has  procured  the  benefit 
of  all  nations  by  the  spiritual  conquest  of  all,  and 
now  is  as  living  and  real  as  ever  it  was,  and  has  from 
the  first  filled  the  world,  all  this  is  one  of  those  co- 
incidences which  are  impossible  without  the  Hand 
of  God  directly  and  immediately  in  them,  444-5; 
how,  as  the  prophecies  said,  the  Messiah  could  both 
suffer,  yet  be  victorious.  His  kingdom  be  Judaic  in 
structure,  yet  evangelic  in  spirit.  His  people  the 
children  of  Abraham,  yet  "sinners  of  the  Gentiles," 
all  this  is  interpreted  for  us,  first  by  the  prophetic 
outline,  and  still  more  by  the  historical  object, 
445-6  (vide  Maze,  Prophecy,  and  Mystery);  vide 
Jews,  and  Apocalypse;  as  regards  the  contrast 
which  is  presented  to  us  between  the  picture  which 
the  old  prophecies  draw  of  the  universality  of  the 
kingdom  of  the  Messiah,  and  that  partial  develop- 
ment of  it  through  the  world,  which  is  all  the  Chris- 
tian Church  can  show,  and  as  regards  the  contrast 


38  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Christianity:  continued. 

between  the  rest  and  peace  which  they  said  He  was 
to  introduce,  and  the  Church's  actual  history,  it  is 
to  be  observed  that  the  failure  of  Christianity  in 
one  respect  in  corresponding  to  those  prophecies 
cannot  destroy  the  force  of  its  correspondence  to 
them  in  others;  moreover,  it  was  quite  aware  from 
the  first  of  its  own  prospective  future,  and  it  meets 
the  difficulty  thence  arising  by  anticipation,  by 
giving  us  its  own  predictions  of  what  it  was  to  be  in 
historical  fact,  447-56;  for  though  our  Lord  claims 
to  be  the  Messiah,  He  shows  little  of  conscious  de- 
pendence on  the  old  Scriptures,  or  of  anxiety  to 
fulfil  them,  and  He  not  so  much  recurs  to  past 
prophecies,  as  utters  new  ones,  with  an  antithesis  not 
unlike  that  which  is  so  impressive  in  the  Sermon  on 
the  Mount,  when  He  first  says,  "  It  has  been  said  by 
them  of  old  time,"  and  then  adds,  "  But  I  say  unto 
you";  this  is  seen  again  in  the  two  special  designa- 
tions which  He  chooses  for  Himself,  Son  of  God  and 
Son  of  Man,  the  latter  of  which  is  only  once  given 
Him  in  the  Old  Scriptures,  while  the  former  was 
never  distinctly  used  of  Him  before  He  came;  in 
those  two  Names  He  separates  Himself  from  the 
Jewish  Dispensation,  in  which  He  was  born,  and 
inaugurates  the  New  Covenant,  448-9;  it  was  a  bold 
conception,  unheard  of  before,  and  worthy  of  divine 
origin,  that  He  should  even  project  a  universal 
religion,  and  that  to  be  effected  by  what  may  be 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  39 

Christianity:  continued. 

called  a  propagandist  movement  from  one  centre; 
He  began,  not  to  fight,  but  to  "  preach  the  kingdom 
of  heaven,"  and  He  said,  "  My  kingdom  is  not  of  this 
world,"  and  He  told  His  disciples  that  they  should 
"be  His  witnesses  to  the  end  of  the  earth,"  should 
"preach  to  all  nations,  beginning  with  Jerusalem," 
etc.,  450-1;  moreover,  on  its  broad  field  of  conflict 
the  preachers  of  Christianity  were  to  be  simply 
unarmed,  and  to  suffer,  but  to  prevail:  "Behold,  I 
send  you  as  sheep  in  the  midst  of  wolves,"  "Blessed 
are  they  that  suffer  persecution,"  etc.;  yet  the  first 
preachers  saw  no  difficulty  in  a  prospect  to  human 
eyes  so  appalling,  so  hopeless;  and  this  is  shown 
most  signally  in  St.  Paul,  as  having  been  a  convert  of 
later  vocation;  his  instrument  of  conversion  is  "the 
foolishness  of  preaching,"  "the  weak  things  of  the 
earth  confound  the  strong,"  etc.,  452-4;  Christianity 
warns  us  that,  though  there  are  at  all  times  many 
holy,  many  religious  men  in  it,  and  though  sanctity 
is  ever  its  life  and  substance  and  germinal  seed,  yet 
there  will  ever  be  many  too,  who  by  their  lives  are  a 
scandal  and  injury  to  it;  for  our  Lord  tells  us  that 
"Many  are  called,  few  are  chosen,"  "the  kingdom 
is  like  to  a  net  which  gathered  together  all  kinds  of 
fishes,"  etc.;  and  He  opens  on  us  the  prospect  of 
ambition  and  rivalry  in  its  leading  members,  when 
He  warns  His  disciples  against  desiring  the  first 
places  in  His  kingdom,  etc.,  454-6;  various  writers 


40  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Christianity:  continued. 

have  attempted  to  assign  human  causes  in  explana- 
tion of  the  rise  and  establishment  of  Christianity; 
Gibbon  especially  has  mentioned  five,  457-63  (vide 
Gibbon);  Christianity  made  its  way,  not  by  indi- 
vidual, but  by  broad,  wholesale  conversions,  462; 
when  He  who  claimed  to  be  the  long-promised,  long- 
expected  Deliverer  of  the  human  race,  left  the  earth, 
His  disciples  took  upon  themselves  to  go  forth  to 
preach  to  all  parts  of  the  earth  with  the  object 
of  preaching  Him,  and  collecting  converts  in  His 
Name;  and  they  wonderfully  succeeded;  large  bodies 
of  men  in  various  places  profess  to  be  His  disciples, 
own  Him  as  their  King,  and  penetrate  into  the  popu- 
lations of  the  Roman  Empire,  and  at  length  convert 
the  Empire  itself,  463;  the  cause  of  their  conversion, 
in  other  words,  the  topics  of  that  preaching  which 
was  so  effective,  we  are  told  by  the  preachers  and 
their  converts;  they  "preached  Christ";  they  called 
on  men  to  believe,  hope,  and  place  their  affections, 
in  that  Deliverer  who  had  come  and  gone;  and  the 
moral  instrument  by  which  they  persuaded  them 
to  do  so,  was  a  description  of  the  life,  character, 
mission,  and  power  of  that  Deliverer,  a  promise  of 
His  invisible  Presence  and  Protection  here,  and  of 
the  Vision  and  Fruition  of  Him  hereafter,  463-4; 
the  universal  Deliverer,  instead  of  making  and 
securing  subjects  by  a  visible  graciousness  or  majesty, 
departs;  hut  is  found,  through  His  preachers,  to  have 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  41 

Christianity:  continued. 

imprinted  the  Image  or  idea  of  Himself  in  the  minds 
of  His  subjects  individually;  and  that  Image,  ap- 
prehended and  worshipped  in  individual  minds, 
becomes  a  principle  of  association,  and  a  real  bond 
of  those  subjects  one  with  another,  who  are  thus 
united  to  the  body  by  being  united  to  that  Image, 
464  (vide  Memory,  Inventive  Faculty,  Real 
Assent,  Individual,  and  Scripture);  moreover, 
that  Image  is  also  the  original  instrument  of  their 
conversion,  464;  only  by  the  Hand  of  God  could 
this  new  idea,  one  and  the  same,  enter  at  once  into 
myriads  of  men,  women,  and  children  of  all  ranks, 
and  last  in  vigour  as  a  sustaining  influence  for  seven 
or  eight  generations,  till  it  forced  its  way  into  the 
fulness  of  imperial  power,  465;  that  this  Thought 
or  Image  of  Christ  was  the  principle  of  conversion 
and  of  fellowship,  is  proved  by  the  words  of  St. 
Paul,  St.  Peter,  and  St.  John;  e.g.,  St.  Paul:  "I 
make  known  to  you  the  gospel  which  I  preached  to 
you,  which  also  you  have  received,  and  wherein  you 
stand;  by  which  also  you  are  saved";  etc.,  465-6; 
that  the  principal  success  of  this  Image  lay  among 
the  lower  classes  is  proved,  (1)  by  the  passage 
wherein  our  Lord  returns  thanks  to  His  Heavenly 
Father,  "because  Thou  hast  hid  these  things  from 
the  wise  and  prudent,  and  hast  revealed  them  to 
little  ones";  (2)  by  the  words  of  St.  Paul:  "not 
many  wise  men  according  to  the  flesh,  not   many 


42  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Christianity:  continued. 

mighty,  not  many  noble/'  became  Christians; 
(3)  by  quotations  from  the  words  and  writings  of 
friends  and  enemies  for  four  centuries,  467-86;  the 
steady  and  rapid  growth  of  Christianity  startled  its 
contemporaries,  and  they  had  two  principal  ways 
of  accounting  for  it,  —  the  obstinacy  of  the  Chris- 
tians and  their  magical  powers,  of  which  the  former 
was  the  explanation  adopted  by  educated  minds, 
and  the  latter  chiefly  by  the  populace,  476;  in  the 
case  of  the  martyrs,  no  intensity  of  torture  had  any 
means  of  affecting  what  was  a  mental  conviction; 
and  the  sovereign  Thought  in  which  they  had  lived 
was  their  adequate  support  and  consolation  in  their 
death,  478;  it  was  fitting  that  those  mixed  unlettered 
multitudes,  who  for  three  centuries  had  suffered 
and  triumphed  by  virtue  of  the  inward  Vision  of 
their  Divine  Lord,  should  be  selected  in  the  fourth, 
to  be  the  special  champions  of  His  Divinity  and  the 
victorious  foes  of  its  impugners,  486;  the  Religion 
of  Nature  can  have  but  one  complement,  and  that 
very  complement  is  Christianity,  487;  Natural  Re- 
ligion is  based  upon  the  sense  of  sin;  it  recognizes 
the  disease,  but  it  cannot  find  the  remedy;  that 
remedy,  both  for  guilt  and  for  moral  impotence,  is 
found  in  the  central  doctrine  of  Revelation,  the 
Mediation  of  Christ,  487;  this  was  the  secret  of  the 
power  of  Christianity  in  the  early  ages  of  the  Church, 
and  this  is  how  at  present  it  is  so  mysteriously  po- 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  43 

Christianity  :  continued. 

tent,  in  spite  of  the  new  and  fearful  adversaries 
which  beset  its  path;  it  has  with  it  the  gift  of  staunch- 
ing and  healing  the  one  deep  wound  of  human  nature; 
it  is  a  living  truth  which  never  can  grow  old,  487; 
its  rites  and  ordinances  are  continually  eliciting  the 
active  interposition  of  that  Omnipotence  in  which 
the  Religion  long  ago  began;  first  is  the  Holy  Mass; 
next  is  the  Holy  Communion;  and  then,  there  is 
His  personal  abidance  in  our  churches,  488;  as 
human  nature  itself  is  still  in  life  and  action  as  much 
as  ever  it  was,  so  He  too  lives  to  our  imaginations, 
by  His  visible  symbols,  as  if  He  were  on  earth,  with 
a  practical  efficacy  which  even  unbelievers  cannot 
deny,  489;  and  Napoleon  declared  that  His  Name 
is  just  the  One  Name  in  the  whole  world  that  lives, 
490-1;  Christianity  is  addressed,  both  as  regards 
its  evidences  and  its  contents,  to  minds  which  are  in 
the  normal  condition  of  human  nature,  as  believing 
in  God  and  in  a  future  judgment;  such  minds  it 
addresses  both  through  the  intellect  and  through 
the  imagination;  creating  a  certitude  of  its  truth  by 
arguments  too  various  for  direct  enumeration,  too 
personal  and  deep  for  words,  too  powerful  and  con- 
current for  refutation,  491-2. 

Christians:  35,  38;  in  regard  to  the  disgust  felt 
towards  the  primitive  Christians,  and  the  deep 
prejudice  now  existing  against  the  Church  among 
Protestants,  and  the  numberless  calumnies  directed 


44  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Christians:  continued. 

against  individual  Catholics,  against  our  religious 
bodies  and  men  in  authority,  as  a  persistence  in  such 
prejudices  is  no  evidence  of  their  truth,  so  an  aban- 
donment of  them  is  no  evidence  that  certitude  can 
fail,  254;  those  Christians  in  this  day  remain  Chris- 
tian only  in  name,  and  (if  it  so  happen)  at  length 
fall  away,  who  are  nothing  deeper  or  better  than 
men  of  the  world,  savants,  literary  men,  or  politicians, 
414. 

Christmas,  139. 

Christus,  469. 

Chrysostom,  St.,  103. 

Church:  it  is  a  familiar  charge  against  the  Catholic 
Church  in  the  mouths  of  her  opponents,  that  she 
imposes  on  her  children  as  matters  of  faith,  a  great 
number  of  doctrines  which  none  but  professed 
theologians  can  understand,  142  (vide  Dogmatic 
Theology);  that  the  Church  is  the  infallible  oracle 
of  truth  is  the  fundamental  dogma  of  the  Catholic 
religion,  153;  the  "One  Holy  Catholic  and  Apos- 
tolic Church"  is  an  article  of  the  Creed,  and  an 
article,  which,  inclusive  of  her  infallibility,  all  men, 
high  and  low,  can  easily  master  and  accept  with  a 
real  and  operative  assent,  150;  the  Catholic  Church, 
though  not  universally  acknowledged,  may  without 
inconsistency  claim  to  teach  the  primary  truths  of 
religion,  just  as  modern  science,  though  but  par- 
tially received,  claims  to  teach  the  great  principles 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  45 

Church:  continued. 

and  laws  which  are  the  foundation  of  secular  knowl- 
edge, and  that  with  a  significance  to  which  no  other 
religious  system  can  pretend,  because  it  is  its  very 
profession  to  speak  to  all  mankind,  and  its  very 
badge  to  be  ever  making  converts  all  over  the  earth, 
242  (vide  Christianity);  the  Catholic  faith  con- 
tains within  itself,  and  claims  as  its  own,  all  truth 
that  is  elsewhere  to  be  found,  and  more  than  all, 
and  nothing  but  truth;  this  is  the  secret  of  the  in- 
fluence by  which  the  Church  draws  to  herself  con- 
verts from  such  various  and  conflicting  religions; 
they  come,  not  so  much  to  lose  what  they  have,  as 
to  gain  what  they  have  not,  249,  377-8;  prejudice 
against  the  Church  among  Protestants,  —  vide 
Christians;  among  political  and  literary  men, — 
vide  Philosophers. 

Cicero,  29,  50,  103,  297. 

CiLiciA,  485. 

Circumstances:  the  circumstances  of  an  act,  however 
necessary  to  it,  do  not  enter  into  the  act,  157. 

Circumstantial  Evidence:  the  principle  of  circum- 
stantial evidence  is  the  reductio  ad  absurdum,  322; 
quotation  about  it  from  Phillipps'  "Law  of  Evi- 
dence," 324;  an  instance  of  the  application  of  the 
principle  in  a  particular  instance,  325-8. 

Civilization:  the  so-called  religion  of  civilization, — 
vide  Philosophy. 

Clanthes,  250. 


46  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Clarke,  Dr.  Samuel:  quoted,  313;  315. 

Classics:  young  and  old  are  differently  affected  by 
the  words  of  a  classic  author,  such  as  Homer  or 
Horace;  passages,  which  to  a  boy  are  but  rhetorical 
commonplaces,  neither  better  nor  worse  than  a 
hundred  others  which  any  clever  writer  might  sup- 
ply, at  length  come  home  to  him,  when  long  years 
have  passed,  and  he  has  had  experience  of  life,  and 
pierce  him,  as  if  he  had  never  before  known  them, 
with  their  sad  earnestness  and  vivid  exactness,  78; 
an  instinctive  sense  that  the  medieval  intellect 
could  not  write  the  classics,  and  a  faith  in  testimony, 
are  the  sufficient,  but  the  undeveloped  argument 
on  which  to  ground  our  certitude  of  the  genuineness 
of  the  classics,  298. 

Clement:  quoted,  475. 

Clinton,  Mr.,  364,  366. 

Clock:  the  sense  of  certitude  illustrated  by  the  action 
of  a  clock,  233,  236. 

"Cogito  ergo  sum"  is  not  an  argument,  but  is  the 
expression  of  a  ratiocinative  instinct,  287  note. 

Coincidence  of  laws,  —  vide  Law. 

Coleridge:  quoted,  305. 

Columbus,  261. 

Complex  Assent  is  an  assent  which  is  made  consciously 
and  deliberately,  189  (vide  Conviction,  and  Cer- 
titude). 

Conclusion:  a  conditional  proposition  expresses  a 
conclusion,  3  (vide  Proposition)  ;  a  conclusion  is  the 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  47 

Conclusion:  continued. 

expression  of  an  act  of  inference,  5;  no  man  will  be 
a  martyr  for  a  conclusion,  93;  a  conclusion  is  but  an 
opinion,  93  (vide  Deduction);  the  conclusions  of 
one  generation  are  the  truths  of  the  next,  229. 

Concrete:  in  concrete  matter  demonstration  is  im- 
possible, 8;  no  number  whatever  of  abstractions  is 
equivalent  to  one  concrete,  33  (vide  Facts,  Lan- 
guage, and  Mind)  ;  reasoning  in  the  concrete,  — 
vide  Informal  Inference,  Natural  Inference, 
and  Reasoning;  it  is  in  human  nature  to  be  more 
affected  by  the  concrete  than  by  the  abstract,  37; 
all  concrete  laws  are  general,  255;  there  is  no  science 
of  reasoning  sufficient  to  compel  certitude  in  con- 
crete conclusions,  350;  we  are  not  justified,  in  the 
case  of  concrete  reasoning,  and  especially  of  religious 
inquiry,  in  waiting  till  logical  demonstration  is  ours, 
412  (vide  Truth)  ;  in  any  inquiry  about  things  in  the 
concrete,  men  differ  from  each  other,  not  so  much 
in  the  soundness  of  their  reasoning  as  in  the  prin- 
ciples which  govern  its  exercise;  those  principles  are 
of  a  personal  character,  and  where  there  is  no  com- 
mon measure  of  minds,  there  is  no  common  measure 
of  arguments,  and  the  validity  of  proof  is  deter- 
mined, not  by  any  scientific  test,  but  by  the  illative 
sense,  413. 

Conditional  Assent:  when  we  use  the  phrase  "con- 
ditional assent,"  we  only  mean  to  say  that  we  will 
assent  under  certain  contingencies,   182;  if  we  in- 


48  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Conditional  Assent:  continued. 

elude  a  condition  in  the  proposition  to  which  our 
assent  is  given,  that  condition  enters  into  the  matter 
of  the  assent,  but  not  into  the  assent  itself,  182. 

Conditional  Proposition,  —  vide  Proposition. 

Conduct:  Aristotle  calls  the  faculty  which  guides  the 
mind  in  matters  of  conduct,  by  the  name  of  phronesis, 
or  judgment,  353-4;  no  science  of  life,  applicable  to 
the  case  of  an  individual,  has  been  or  can  be  written, 
354;  what  is  written  is  too  vague,  too  negative  for 
our  need;  it  bids  us  avoid  extremes,  but  it  cannot 
ascertain  for  us,  according  to  our  personal  need,  the 
golden  mean,  354;  the  authoritative  oracle,  which 
is  to  decide  our  path,  is  seated  in  the  mind  of  the 
individual,  who  is  thus  his  own  law,  his  own  teacher, 
and  his  own  judge  in  those  special  cases  of  duty 
which  are  personal  to  him;  it  comes  of  an  acquired 
habit,  though  it  has  its  first  origin  in  nature  itself, 
and  it  is  formed  and  matured  by  practice  and  ex- 
perience; it  is  a  capacity  sufficient  for  the  occasion, 
deciding  what  ought  to  be  done  here  and  now,  by 
this  given  person,  under  these  given  circumstances; 
it  decides  nothing  hypothetical,  354-5;  it  has  an 
elasticity,  which  is  not  studious  to  maintain  the  ap- 
pearance of  consistency,  and  thus  it  differs  from  state 
or  public  law  which  is  inflexible,  355;  in  this  respect 
the  law  of  truth  differs  from  the  law  of  duty,  that 
duties  change,  but  truths  never,  355;  to  learn  his 
own  duty  in  his  ow^n  case,  each  individual  must 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  49 

Conduct:  continued. 

have  recourse  to  his  own  rule;  and  if  his  rule  is  not 
sufficiently  developed  in  his  intellect  for  his  need, 
then  he  goes  to  some  other  living,  present  authority, 
to  supply  it  for  him,  356  (vide  Phronesis). 

CONGREGATIONALIST,   32. 

Conscience:  conscience  is  the  sense  of  moral  obliga- 
tion, 104;  its  action  is  aided  by  teachers,  and  is 
influenced  by  certain  original  forms  of  thinking  or 
formative  ideas,  connatural  with  our  minds,  64,  112, 
115,  390;  we  can  attain  to  a  real  assent  to  the  Being 
of  a  God,  and  enter  with  a  personal  knowledge  into 
the  circle  of  truths  which  make  up  that  great  thought, 
by  an  instinctive  association  of  His  presence  with 
the  phenomena  of  conscience,  102-4  (vide  Phe- 
nomena, and  Instinct)  ;  from  the  perceptive  power 
which  identifies  the  intimations  of  conscience  with 
the  reverberations  or  echoes  (so  to  say)  of  an  external 
admonition,  we  proceed  on  to  the  notion  of  a  Su- 
preme Ruler  and  Judge,  and  then  again  we  image 
Him  and  His  attributes  in  those  recurring  intima- 
tions; and,  if  the  impressions  which  His  creatures 
make  on  us  through  our  senses  oblige  us  to  regard 
those  creatures  as  sui  generis  respectively,  it  is  not 
wonderful  that  the  notices,  which  He  indirectly 
gives  us  through  our  conscience,  of  His  own  nature 
are  such  as  to  make  us  understand  that  He  is  like 
Himself  and  like  nothing  else,  104;  in  explaining 
how  we  gain  an  image  of  God  and  give  a  real  assent 


50  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Conscience:  continued. 

to  the  proposition  that  He  exists,  Newman  assumes 
that  we  have  by  nature  a  conscience,  105;  the  feeling 
of  conscience  is  a  certain  keen  sensibility,  pleasant 
or  painful,  —  self-approval  and  hope,  or  compunc- 
tion and  fear,  —  attendant  on  certain  of  our  actions, 
which  in  consequence  we  call  right  or  wrong;  this 
feeling  is  twofold:  it  is  a  moral  sense  and  a  sense  of 
duty;  a  judgment  of  the  reason  and  a  magisterial 
dictate;  its  act  is  indivisible,  but  it  has  these  two 
aspects,  distinct  from  each  other,  either  one  of  which 
may  be  lost  without  the  other  being  lost,  105-6; 
conscience  has  both  a  critical  and  a  judicial  office, 
and  though  its  promptings  are  not  in  all  cases  cor- 
rect, that  does  not  necessarily  interfere  with  the 
force  of  its  testimony  and  of  its  sanction:  its  tes- 
timony that  there  is  a  right  and  a  wrong,  and  its 
sanction  to  that  testimony  conveyed  in  the  feelings 
which  attend  on  right  or  wrong  conduct,  106;  con- 
science is  spoken  of  in  the  Grammar  of  Assent  as 
a  sanction  of  right  conduct,  106;  this  is  its  primary 
and  most  authoritative  aspect,  and  is  the  ordinary 
sense  of  the  word,  106;  it  corresponds  to  the  sense 
of  the  beautiful;  but  this  sense  has  no  special  rela- 
tions to  persons,  but  contemplates  objects  in  them- 
selves; whereas  conscience  is  concerned  with  persons 
primarily,  and  with  actions  mainly  as  viewed  in 
their  doers;  further,  taste  is  its  own  evidence,  ap- 
pealing to   nothing   beyond   its   own  sense  of  the 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  51 

Conscience:  continued. 

beautiful  or  the  ugly;  but  conscience  does  not  repose 
on  itself,  as  is  evidenced  in  that  keen  sense  of  obliga- 
tion and  responsibility  which  informs  its  decisions; 
hence  we  speak  of  conscience  as  a  voice,  imperative 
and  constraining,  like  no  other  dictate  in  the  whole 
of  our  experience,  107;  conscience  has  an  intimate 
bearing  on  our  affections  and  emotions,  leading  us 
to  self-reproach,  poignant  shame,  haunting  remorse, 
chill  dismay  at  the  prospect  of  the  future;  and  their 
contraries,  when  the  conscience  is  good,  self-approval, 
inward  peace,  lightness  of  heart,  etc.;  these  emotions 
constitute  a  specific  difference  between  conscience  and 
our  other  intellectual  senses,  108;  it  is  always,  what 
the  sense  of  the  beautiful  is  only  in  certain  cases,  it 
is  always  emotional;  it  always  involves  the  recogni- 
tion of  a  living  object  towards  which  it  is  directed; 
inanimate  things  cannot  stir  our  affections,  109-10, 
391;  this  implies  that  there  is  One  to  whom  we  are 
responsible,  before  whom  we  are  ashamed,  whose 
claims  upon  us  we  fear,  109-10  (vide  Inventive 
Faculty);  the  phenomena  of  conscience,  as  a  dic- 
tate, avail  to  impress  the  imagination  with  the 
picture  of  a  Supreme  Governor,  a  Judge,  holy,  just, 
powerful,  all-seeing,  retributive,  and  is  the  creative 
principle  of  religion,  as  the  moral  sense  is  the  prin- 
ciple of  ethics,  110;  that  an  infant  should  be  able  in 
the  dictate  of  conscience,  without  previous  expe- 
rience or  analogous  reasoning,  gradually  to  perceive 


52  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Conscience:  continued. 

the  voice,  or  the  echoes  of  the  voice,  of  a  Master, 
living,  personal,  and  sovereign,  is  not  more  strange 
or  difficult  than  that  he  should  have  a  knowledge 
of  his  mother  or  nurse,  111-12;  if  a  child  of  five  or 
six  years  old  has  already  mastered  and  appropriated 
thoughts  and  beliefs,  in  such  sort  as  to  be  able  to 
handle  and  apply  them  familiarly,  according  to  the 
occasion,  as  principles  of  intellectual  action,  those 
beliefs  at  the  very  least  must  be  singularly  con- 
genial to  his  mind,  if  not  connatural  with  its  initial 
action,  112;  vide  Children;  an  ordinary  child,  if  he 
has  offended  his  parents,  will  all  alone  and  without 
effort,  as  if  it  were  the  most  natural  of  acts,  place 
himself  in  the  presence  of  God,  and  beg  of  Him  to 
set  him  right  with  them;  this  shows  that  the  child 
has  in  his  mind  the  image  of  an  Invisible  Being, 
who  exercises  a  particular  providence  among  us, 
who  is  present  every  where,  who  is  heart-reading, 
heart-changing,  ever-accessible,  open  to  impet ra- 
tion, 112-3;  this  image  is  that  of  One  who  is  good, 
inasmuch  as  enjoining  and  enforcing  what  is  right 
and  good,  and  who  kindles  in  him  love  towards  Him, 
as  giving  him  a  good  law,  and  therefore  as  being 
good  Himself;  and  the  child,  having  a  sensibility 
towards  truth,  purity,  justice,  kindness,  and  the 
like,  which  are  but  shapes  and  aspects  of  goodness, 
for  the  sake  of  them  all  is  moved  to  love  the  Law- 
giver, who  enjoins  them  upon  him;  and  as  he  can 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  53 

Conscience:  continued. 

contemplate  them  under  the  common  name  of 
goodness,  he  is  prepared  to  think  of  them  as  indi- 
visible, correlative,  supplementary  of  each  other  in 
one  and  the  same  Personality,  so  that  there  is  no 
aspect  of  goodness  which  God  is  not,  113-14;  this 
apprehension  of  God  acts  promptly  and  keenly  in 
children,  by  reason  of  the  paucity  of  their  ideas, 
114-15;  though  he  cannot  explain  or  define  the  word 
"God,"  when  told  to  use  it,  his  acts  show  that  to 
him  it  is  far  more  than  a  word,  115;  whether  the 
elements  of  the  image  of  God,  latent  in  the  mind, 
would  ever  be  elicited  without  extrinsic  help  is  very 
doubtful,  115,  390;  it  admits  of  being  strengthened 
and  improved;  but  whether  it  grows  brighter  and 
stronger,  or  is  dimmed,  distorted,  or  obliterated, 
depends  on  each  of  us  individually,  and  on  his  cir- 
cumstances, 115-16,  390;  a  mind  carefully  formed 
upon  the  basis  of  its  natural  conscience  has  a  living 
hold  on  truths  which  are  really  to  be  found  in  the 
world,  though  they  are  not  upon  the  surface;  it 
interprets  what  it  sees  around  it  by  this  previous 
inward  teaching,  as  the  true  key  of  that  maze  of 
vast  complicated  disorder,  and  thus  it  gains  a  more 
and  more  consistent  and  luminous  vision  of  God 
from  the  most  unpromising  materials;  thus  con- 
science is  a  connecting  principle  between  the  crea- 
ture and  his  Creator,  116-17  (vide  Religion);  this 
vivid  apprehension  of  religious  objects  is  independ- 


54  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Conscience:  continued. 

ent  of  the  written  records  of  Revelation,  but  Chris- 
tianity adds  greatly  to  its  fulness  and  exactness, 
llS-19;  conscience  is  recognized  by  the  great  mass 
both  of  the  young  and  of  the  uneducated,  by  the 
religious  few  and  the  irreligious  many,  by  philos- 
ophers, in  all  ages  and  places,  to  be  the  voice  of  a 
solemn  Monitor,  personal,  peremptory,  unargu- 
mentative,  irresponsible,  minatory,  definitive,  122-3; 
we  may  lose  in  manhood  and  in  age  that  sense  of  a 
Supreme  Teacher  and  Judge  which  was  the  gift  of 
our  first  years,  because  in  most  men  the  imagination 
suffers  from  the  lapse  of  time  and  the  experience  of 
life,  123;  conscience  compared  with  the  sense  of 
certitude,  233-4;  conscience  is  a  personal  guide,  and 
I  use  it  because  I  must  use  myself,  389;  it  requires 
nothing  besides  itself,  and  is  thus  adapted  for  the 
communication  to  each  separately  of  that  knowledge 
which  is  most  momentous  to  him  individually,  390; 
it  teaches  us,  not  only  that  God  is,  but  what  He  is, 
and  provides  for  the  mind  a  real  image  of  Him,  as  a 
medium  of  worship,  390;  we  learn  from  its  informa- 
tions to  conceive  of  the  Almighty,  primarily  as  a 
God  of  Judgment  and  Justice,  as  One,  who,  not 
simply  for  the  good  of  the  offender,  but  as  an  end 
good  in  itself,  and  as  a  principle  of  government, 
ordains  that  the  offender  should  suffer  for  his  offence, 
390-1;  the  aspect  under  which  Almighty  God  is 
presented  to  us  by  Nature,  is  of  One  who  is  angry 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  55 

Conscience:  continued. 

with  us,  and  threatens  evil;  hence  its  effect  is  to 
burden  and  sadden  the  religious  mind,  391;  where 
conscience  is,  fear  must  be,  426  (vide  Truth). 

Conscientiousness:  even  the  ordinary  matters  of  life 
are  an  exercise  of  conscientiousness;  it  is  insisted 
upon  in  writing,  painting,  and  singing;  and  so  it  has 
surely  a  place  in  the  most  serious  of  all  undertakings, 
the  inquiry  into  the  truth  of  Christianity,  426  (vide 
Inquiry,  and  Truth). 

Conservative,  85. 

Consistency  is  not  always  the  guarantee  of  truth;  but 
there  may  be  a  consistency  in  a  theory  so  variously 
tried  and  exemplified  as  to  lead  to  belief  in  it,  323; 
nothing  is  more  common  than  to  praise  men  for 
their  consistency  to  their  principles,  whatever  those 
principles  are,  that  is,  to  praise  them  on  an  inference, 
without  thereby  implying  any  assent  to  the  prin- 
ciples themselves,  38-9. 

CONSTANTINE,   142,   143. 

Consubstantial:  this  word  was  inserted  into  the 
Creed  of  the  Church  by  the  Council  of  Nicsea,  142; 
Bishop  Jeremy  Taylor's  view  of  this  insertion, 
142-4;  the  word  has  a  plain  meaning,  as  the  Council 
used  it;  for  "consubstantial  with  the  Father,"  means 
nothing  more  than  "really  one  with  the  Father," 
144;  it  is  the  one  instance  of  a  scientific  word  having 
been  introduced  into  the  Creed,  144. 

Controversy,  a  writer  of,  32. 


56  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Conversion:  with  Newman  some  exertion  on  the  part 
of  the  persons  whom  he  is  to  convert  is  a  condition 
of  a  true  conversion;  they  who  have  no  religious 
earnestness  are  at  the  mercy,  day  by  day,  of  some 
new  argument  or  fact,  which  may  overtake  them, 
in  favour  of  one  conclusion  or  the  other,  425  (vide 
Paley,  Truth,  and  Moral  Being). 

Converts  come  to  the  Catholic  faith,  taking  their 
certitudes  with  them,  not  to  lose,  but  to  keep  them 
more  securely,  and  to  understand  and  love  their 
objects  more  perfectly,  249  (vide  Religion,  and 
Church). 

Conviction:  a  conviction  is  an  assent,  not  only  to  a 
given  proposition,  but  to  the  claim  of  that  proposi- 
tion on  our  assent  as  true;  it  is  an  assent  to  an  assent, 
195;  a  conviction  of  a  proposition  objectively  true 
as  well  as  subjectively  is  a  certitude,  195-6  (vide 
Certitude);  Protestants  use  the  word  in  the  sense 
of  opinion,  59. 

Corpus  Christi,  139. 

Councils:  the  repudiations  of  error  contained  in  the 
Canons  of  Councils  will  ever  be  foreign,  strange, 
and  hard  to  the  pious  but  uncontroversial  mind; 
for  good  Christians  have  nothing  to  do,  in  the 
ordinary  course  of  things,  with  the  subtle  hallu- 
cinations of  the  intellect,  148-9  (vide  Dogmatic 
Theology). 

Court:  rules  of  court  are  dictated  by  what  is  expedient 
on  the  whole  and  in  the  long  run;  but  they  incur  the 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  57 

Court:  continued. 

risk   of  being   unjust   to  the  claims   of   particular 
cases,  424. 

Creator:  the  Creator  is  incomprehensible  by  an  in- 
communicable attribute,  283. 

Credence:  credence  is  a  notional  assent,  42;  giving 
credence  to  propositions  is  pretty  much  the  same 
as  having  "no  doubt"  about  them;  it  is  the  sort  of 
assent  which  we  give  to  those  opinions  and  professed 
facts  which  are  ever  presenting  themselves  to  us 
without  any  effort  of  ours,  and  which  we  commonly 
take  for  granted;  it  is  of  an  otiose  and  passive  char- 
acter; these  informations,  received  with  a  sponta- 
neous assent  from  a  great  variety  of  subject-matters, 
constitute  the  furniture  of  the  mind;  they  are  its 
education,  as  far  as  general  knowledge  can  so  be 
called,  53;  to  believe  frankly  what  it  is  told,  is  in  the 
young  an  exercise  of  teachableness  and  humility, 
54;  the  ungrudging,  prompt  assents  of  credence  put 
us  in  possession  of  the  principles,  doctrines,  senti- 
ments, facts,  which  constitute  useful,  and  especially 
liberal  knowledge;  they  give  us  in  great  measure 
our  morality,  our  politics,  etc.;  they  supply  the 
elements  of  public  opinion;  they  are  our  channels 
of  sympathy,  and  become  our  moral  language,  54; 
the  assent  of  credence  is  the  ordinary  assent  of  an 
Englishman  to  his  religion,  55-8  (vide  England, 
Church  of);  difference  between  credence  and 
opinion,  —  vide  Opinion. 


58  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Credenda:  the  credenda  of  the  Church  contain  nu- 
merous notional  propositions,  145-G  (vide  Dog- 
matic Theology). 

Creeds:  the  doctrine  of  the  Holy  Trinity  in  Unity  is 
not  called  a  mystery  in  the  Creeds ;  the  reason  seems 
to  be  that  the  Creeds  have  a  place  in  the  Ritual; 
they  are  devotional  acts  and  of  the  nature  of  prayers, 
addressed  to  God,  132;  the  ante-Nicene  Symbols 
add  summarily  one  or  two  notional  articles,  such 
as  "the  communion  of  Saints,''  and  "the  forgive- 
ness of  sins,"  which,  however,  may  be  readily  con- 
verted into  real  propositions,  144-5;  the  dogma  of 
the  Real  Presence  is  necessarily  absent  from  all  of 
them,  owing  to  the  ancient  "  Disciplina  Arcani,"  145. 

Criterion:  certitude  does  not  admit  of  an  interior, 
immediate  test,  sufficient  to  discriminate  it  from 
false  certitude;  but  indefectibility  may  serve  as  a 
negative  test  of  certitude,  or  sine  qua  non  condition, 
so  that  whoever  loses  his  conviction  on  a  given 
point  is  thereby  proved  not  to  have  been  certain  of 
it,  255-6;  our  criterion  of  truth  is  not  so  much  the 
manipulation  of  propositions,  as  the  intellectual 
and  moral  character  of  the  person  maintaining  them, 
and  the  ultimate  silent  effect  of  his  arguments  or 
conclusions  upon  our  minds,  302  (vide  Informal 
Inference,  and  Truth);  the  sole  and  final  judg- 
ment on  the  validity  of  an  inference  in  concrete 
matter  is  committed  to  the  personal  action  of  the 
ratiocinative  faculty,  345   (vide  Illative  Sense); 


THE  GRAMMAR   OF   ASSENT  59 

Criterion:  continued. 

in  no  class  of  concrete  reasonings  is  there  any  ulti- 
mate test  of  truth  and  error  in  our  inferences  besides 
the  trustworthiness  of  the  Illative  Sense  that  gives 
them  its  sanction,  359,  413  (vide  Concrete);  there 
is  no  ultimate  test  of  truth  besides  the  testimony 
born  to  truth  by  the  mind  itself,  and  this  phenome- 
non is  a  normal  and  inevitable  characteristic  of  the 
mental  constitution  of  a  being  like  man  on  a  stage 
such  as  the  world,  350. 

Cromwell,  340. 

Crucifix:   the  Crucifix   secures   the  thought   of  the 
Deliverer  in  every  house  and  chamber,  489. 

Cruelty,  —  vide  Sin. 

"Cuique  in  arte  sua  credendum  est,"  341,  45. 

"  Cursed  is  he  that  doth  the  work  of  the  Lord  deceit- 
fully," 141. 

D 

Damaris,  423. 

Danaides,  208. 

David,  337,  457. 

Davy,  102. 

Dead   Man:  the  sight  of  a  dead  man  restored  to  life 

would   not   shake   our   certitude   about   his   death, 

256-7. 
Death:  our  certitude  of  our  future  death  is  reached 

through  informal  inference,  298-301;  the  strongest 

proof  I   have   for   my   inevitable   mortality   is   the 


60  AN   INDEXED   SYNOPOSIS   OF 

Death:  continued, 
reductio  ad  ahsurdum;  there  is  a  considerable  '^sur- 
plusage/' as  Locke  calls  it,  of  belief  over  proof,  when 
I  determine  that  I  individually  must  die,  300. 

Deductions  have  no  power  of  persuasion,  92  (vide 
Conclusion). 

Degrees  :  we  might  as  well  talk  of  degrees  of  truth  as 
of  degrees  of  assent,  174;  degrees  refer  to  the  rela- 
tion of  the  conclusion  towards  its  premisses,  179-80; 
vide  Assent,  and  Assent  and  Inference. 

Deism,  241. 

Deist,  85,  246. 

Deliberate  Assent  is  an  assent  following  upon 
deliberation;  it  is  sometimes  called  a  conviction,  183. 

"  Delirant  reges,  plectuntur  Achivi,"  405. 

Deliverer  of  the  human  race,  434,  463-4,  488;  vide 
Christianity. 

Demerara,  295. 

Democrat,  85. 

Demonstration  is  impossible  in  concrete  matter,  8; 
vide  Syllogism,  and  Logic. 

Depositum  of  faith  is  the  revealed  word,  152  (vide 
Dogmatic  Theology). 

Dervishes,  404. 

Descartes:  dispute  between  Descartes  and  Gassendi, 
287  note. 

Detectives:  experts  and  detectives,  when  employed 
to  investigate  mysteries,  in  cases  whether  of  the 
civil  or  criminal  law,  discern  and  follow  out  indica- 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  61 

Detectives:  continued. 

tions  which  promise  solution  with  a  sagacity  incom- 
prehensible to  ordinary  men,  332. 

Deuteronomy,  435. 

Development  of  Doctrine,  Newman's,  163  note,  396  note, 
477  note. 

Devotion:  devotion  must  have  its  objects;  those 
objects,  as  being  supernatural,  when  not  represented 
to  our  senses  by  material  symbols,  must  be  set 
before  the  mind  in  propositions,  121  (vide  Relig- 
ion); it  is  excited  by  the  plain,  categorical  truths 
of  revelation,  such  as  the  articles  of  the  Creed;  on 
these  it  depends;  with  these  it  is  satisfied;  it  accepts 
them  one  by  one;  it  is  careless  about  intellectual 
consistency,  146-7;  vide  God. 

Dido,  11,  296. 

Diocletian:  quoted,  476. 

DiONYSius,  423. 

Disbelief  in  a  proposition  is  an  assent  to  its  contra- 
dictory, 6  (vide  Doubt). 

"Disciplina  Arcani,"  145. 

Discretion  in  conduct,  —  vide  Taste. 

Discussion:  if  we  assume  nothing  but  what  has  uni- 
versal reception,  the  field  of  our  possible  discussions 
will  suffer  much  contraction;  so  that  it  must  be 
considered  sufficient  in  any  inquiry,  if  the  principles 
or  facts  assumed  have  a  large  following,  122. 

Discussions  and  Arguments,  Newman's,  91  note;  quoted, 
92-7. 


62  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Dives,  312. 

Divine  Legation  of  Moses,  Warburton's,  373. 

Divine  Providence,  —  vide  Providence,  Divine. 

Dmouski:  quoted,  186  note,  187  note. 

Doctrines:  the  same  doctrines,  as  held  in  different 
religions,  may  be  and  often  are  held  very  differently, 
as  belonging  to  distinct  wholes  or  forms,  and  exposed 
to  the  influence  and  the  bias  of  the  teaching,  perhaps 
false,  with  which  they  are  associated,  251. 

Dogma:  a  dogma  is  a  proposition;  it  stands  for  a  notion 
or  for  a  thing;  and  to  believe  it  is  to  give  the  assent 
of  the  mind  to  it,  as  it  stands  for  the  one  or  for  the 
other;  to  give  a  real  assent  to  it  is  an  act  of  religion; 
to  give  a  notional  is  a  theological  act ;  it  is  discerned, 
rested  in,  and  appropriated  as  a  reality,  by  the 
religious  imagination;  it  is  held  as  a  truth,  by  the 
theological  intellect;  there  cannot  be  any  line  of 
demarcation  or  party-wall  between  these  two  modes 
of  assent,  the  religious  and  the  theological,  98. 

Dogmatic  Theology:  theological  science  is  the  exer- 
cise of  the  intellect  upon  the  credenda  of  revelation, 
147;  though  not  directly  devotional,  it  is  at  once 
natural,  excellent,  and  necessary;  its  deductions  are 
true,  if  rightly  deduced,  because  they  are  deduced 
from  what  is  true;  and  therefore  in  one  sense  they 
are  a  portion  of  the  depositum  of  faith  or  credenda, 
while  in  another  sense  they  are  additions  to  it,  147; 
the  disavowal  of  error  is  far  more  fruitful  in  addi- 
tions than  the  enforcement  of  truth,  148;  the  greater 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  63 

Dogmatic  Theology:  continued. 

number  of  the  statements  of  theology  are  more  or 
less  unintelligible  to  the  ordinary  Catholic,  as  law- 
books to  the  private  citizen,  148  (vide  Councils); 
the  Catholic  Church  is  charged  with  imposing  on 
her  children,  as  matters  of  faith,  a  great  number  of 
doctrines  which  none  but  professed  theologians  can 
understand,  142,  145-6,  149;  the  Church  must 
exclude  heretics  from  her  communion,  and  the  rule 
she  makes  for  this  purpose  must  be  accepted  by  all, 
since  there  cannot  be  two  rules  of  faith  in  the  same 
communion;  and  it  would  be  a  greater  difficulty  to 
allow  of  an  uncertain  rule  of  faith  than  (if  that  was 
the  alternative,  as  it  is  not)  to  impose  upon  un- 
educated minds  a  profession  which  they  cannot 
understand;  but  it  is  not  the  fact  that  the  Church 
imposes  dogmatic  statements  on  the  interior  assent 
of  those  who  cannot  apprehend  them;  the  difficulty 
is  removed  by  the  dogma  of  the  Church's  infallibility, 
and  of  the  consequent  duty  of  "implicit  faith"  in 
her  word;  for  what  the  Catholic  cannot  understand, 
at  least  he  can  believe  to  be  true;  and  he  believes  it 
to  be  true  because  he  believes  in  the  Church,  149- 
50  (vide  Church);  it  also  stands  to  reason  that  a 
doctrine,  so  deep  and  so  various,  as  the  revealed 
depositum  of  faith,  cannot  be  brought  home  to  us 
and  made  our  own  all  at  once;  but  he  who  believes 
in  it  at  all  embraces  in  his  intention  by  one  act  of 
faith  all  that  there  is  to  believe  whenever  and  as 


64  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Dogmatic  Theology:  continued. 

soon  as  it  is  brought  home  to  him;  so  that  every 
Catholic,  in  accepting  the  depositum,  does  implicite 
accept  the  dogmatic  decisions  of  the  Church;  for 
these  decisions  are  virtually  contained  in  the  re- 
vealed word,  since  the  Church  declares  that  they 
really  belong  to  it,  and  the  Church  is  the  infallible 
interpreter  of  revelation,  151-3  (vide  Church);  "I 
believe  what  the  Church  proposes  to  be  believed" 
is  an  act  of  real  assent,  including  all  particular 
assents,  notional  and  real,  153;  vide  God. 

DoLLiNGER,  Dr.,  466  note. 

DOROTHEUS,   484. 

Doubt:  vide  Proposition;  it  is  a  suspense  of  mind,  7; 
to  have  "no  doubt"  about  a  thesis  is  equivalent  to 
inferring  it  or  else  assenting  to  it,  7;  the  word  is 
often  taken  to  mean  the  deliberate  recognition  of  a 
thesis  as  being  false;  in  this  sense  doubt  is  nothing 
else  than  an  assent,  viz.,  an  assent  to  a  proposition 
at  variance  with  the  thesis,  7-8,  195;  there  are  no 
pleasures  of  doubt,  if  doubt  simply  means  ignorance, 
uncertainty,  or  hopeless  suspense;  but  there  is  a 
certain  grave  acquiescence  in  ignorance,  a  recogni- 
tion of  our  impotence  to  solve  momentous  and 
urgent  questions,  which  has  a  satisfaction  of  its  own; 
the  satisfaction  does  not  lie  in  not  knowing,  but  in 
knowing  there  is  nothing  to  know,  208-9;  there  are 
writers  who  lay  down  as  a  general  proposition  that 
we  have  no  right  in  philosophy  to  make  any  assump- 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  65 

Doubt:  continued. 

tion  whatever,  and  that  we  ought  to  begin  with  a 
universal  doubt;  this,  however,  is  of  all  assumptions 
the  greatest,  and  to  forbid  assumptions  universally 
is  to  forbid  this  one  in  particular;  doubt  itself  is  a 
positive  state,  and  implies  a  definite  habit  of  mind, 
and  thereby  necessarily  involves  a  system  of  prin- 
ciples and  doctrines  all  its  own;  again,  our  very 
method  of  reasoning,  our  nature  itself,  the  very 
sense  of  pleasure  and  pain,  are  assumptions,  377;  of 
the  two,  I  would  rather  have  to  maintain  that  we 
ought  to  begin  with  believing  everything  that  is 
offered  to  our  acceptance,  than  that  it  is  our  duty 
to  doubt  of  everything;  the  former  seems  the  true 
way  of  learning;  in  that  case,  we  soon  discover  and 
discard  what  is  contradictory  to  itself,  377. 

AoiacTTLKov,  353  7iote. 

Drama:  the  ideal  personages  who  figure  in  romances 
and  dramas  of  the  old  school  are  the  product  only  of 
general  notions,  33. 

Duelling:  the  dreamy  acquiescence  of  the  governing 
classes  in  the  barbarism  of  duelling  was  changed  into 
a  realization  by  the  growing  intelligence  of  the  com- 
munity, and  the  shock  inflicted  upon  it  by  the 
tragical  circumstances  of  a  particular  duel,  78. 

"Dulce  et  decorum  est  pro  patria  mori,"  10. 

"Dum  Capitolium  scandet  cum  tacita  Virgine  Ponti- 
fex,"  10. 

Duty:  vide  Conduct;  the  law  of  truth  differs  from  the 


66  ^A^  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Duty:  continued. 

law  of  duty  in  this,  that  duties  change,  but  truths 
never,  355. 

E 

Earth:  moral  evidence  is  all  that  we  can  attain  in 
proof  of  the  earth's  rotatory  motion,  318-19. 

Easter,  139. 

Eastern  Sages,  450. 

Economist  deals  with  facts,  21;  37. 

Economy:  in  theological  investigations  an  economy 
is  the  use  of  a  definition  or  a  formula,  not  as  exact, 
but  as  being  sufficient  for  our  purpose,  for  working 
out  certain  conclusions,  for  a  practical  approxima- 
tion, the  error  being  small,  till  a  certain  point  is 
/      reached,  47. 

\  Egotism:  in  mental  or  moral  science,  as  in  the  Evi- 
dences of  Religion,  in  Metaphysics,  and  in  Ethics, 
egotism  is  true  modesty,  384;  in  religious  inquiry 
each  of  us  can  speak  only  for  himself,  and  for  him- 
self he  has  a  right  to  speak;  what  satisfies  him  is 
likely  to  satisfy  others;  though  great  numbers  of 
men  refuse  to  inquire  at  all,  it  causes  him  no  un- 
easiness; but  he  brings  together  his  reasons,  and 
relies  on  them,  because  they  are  his  own,  and  this 
is  his  primary  evidence;  and  he  has  a  second  ground 
of  evidence,  in  the  testimony  of  those  who  agree 
with  him,  385-6. 

Egypt,  448,  477,  485. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  67 

Elias,  280,  281. 

EmjmanueL;  449. 

Emotions,  —  vide  Affections,  and  Conscience. 

Enceladus,  198. 

England,  33,  199. 

England,  Church  of:  religion  may  be  made  the  sub- 
ject of  notional  assent,  and  is  especially  so  made  in 
our  own  country,  55;  "Bible  Religion"  is  both  the 
recognized  title  and  the  best  description  of  English 
religion;  it  professes  to  be  little  more  than  reading 
the  Bible  and  leading  a  correct  life;  its  doctrines  are 
not  so  much  facts,  as  stereotyped  aspects  of  facts; 
it  is  suspicious  and  protests,  or  is  frightened,  when 
our  Lord,  the  Blessed  Virgin,  or  the  Holy  Apostles, 
are  spoken  of  as  real  beings,  and  really  such  as 
Scripture  implies  them  to  be;  God's  Providence  is 
nearly  the  only  doctrine  held  with  a  real  assent  by 
the  mass  of  religious  Englishmen,  56-7;  252;  vide 
Scripture. 

Enigmas:  in  those  enigmatical  sayings  which  were 
frequent  in  the  early  stage  of  human  society,  the 
problem  proposed  to  the  acuteness  of  the  hearers 
is  to  find  some  real  thing  which  may  unite  in  itself 
certain  conflicting  notions  which  in  the  question  are 
attributed  to  it;  the  answer,  which  names  the  thing, 
interprets  and  thereby  limits  the  notions  under 
which  it  has  been  represented,  48  (vide  Maze). 

Enlargement:  to  the  disconsolate,  the  tempted,  the 
perplexed,  the  suffering,  there  comes,  by  means  of 


68  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Enlargement:  continued. 

their  very  trials,  an  enlargement  of  thought,  which 
enables  them  to  see  in  Holy  Scripture  what  they 
never  saw  before,  79. 

Enthusiasts  mistake  their  own  thoughts  for  inspira- 
tions, 331. 

Epiphany,  139. 

Epipodius,  words  of,  482. 

Erastian,  85. 

Error:  the  disavowal  of  error  is  far  more  fruitful  in 
additions  to  the  credenda  of  the  Church  than  the 
enforcement  of  truth,  148;  errors  in  reasoning  are 
lessons  and  warnings,  not  to  give  up  reasoning,  but 
to  reason  with  greater  caution,  230;  if,  while  weigh- 
ing the  arguments  on  one  side  and  the  other  and 
drawing  our  conclusion,  that  old  mistake  has  already 
been  allowed  for,  then  it  has  no  outstanding  claim 
against  our  acceptance  of  that  conclusion,  after  it 
has  actually  been  drawn,  230-1;  this  illustrated  by 
the  mistake  made  in  taking  for  a  man  the  shadow 
formed  by  the  moonlight  falling  on  the  interstices 
of  some  branches  or  their  foliage,  and  also  by  the 
mistake  made  as  regards  the  identity  of  the  real 
culprit  in  a  court  of  justice,  231-2. 

"  Et  tu,  Brute,"  27. 

Eternity:  eternity  or  endlessness  is  in  itself  mainly 
a  negative  idea,  though  the  idea  of  suffering  is  posi- 
tive; its  fearful  force,  as  an  element  of  future  punish- 
ment, lies  in  what  it  excludes;  it  means  never  any 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  69 

Eternity:  continued. 

change  of  state,  no  annihilation  or  restoration;  but 
what,  considered  positively,  it  adds  to  suffering,  we 
do  not  know,  422;  501-3. 

Etna,  198. 

Euclid,  181,  271,  278,  287  note. 

Europe,  72,  242. 

EusEBius,  485. 

Evangelical  Religion,  56. 

Evangelists:  the  evangelists  betray  an  earnestness 
to  trace  in  our  Lord's  Person  and  history  the  ac- 
complishment of  prophecy,  448;  449,  450,  451. 

"Every  one  must  bear  his  own  burden,"  405. 

Evidences  of  Religion,  —  vide  Paley,  Chris- 
tianity, and  Egotism. 

Evil:  the  real  mystery  is,  not  that  evil  should  never 
have  an  end,  but  that  it  should  have  had  a  begin- 
ning, 398-9;  the  existence  of  evil  cannot  be  ex- 
plained except  by  saying  that  another  will  besides 
God's  has  had  a  part  in  the  disposition  of  His  work, 
that  there  is  a  quarrel  without  remedy,  a  chronic 
alienation,  between  God  and  man,  399;  good  is  the 
rule,  and  evil  the  exception,  117,  402;  the  laws  on 
which  this  world  is  governed  make  it  probable  that 
evil  will  never  die  out  of  the  creation;  experience 
teaches  us  that  man  is  not  sufficient  for  his  own 
happiness,  that  disobedience  to  his  sense  of  right  is 
even  by  itself  misery,  and  that  he  carries  that  misery 
about   him,  wherever  he  is,  that  he  cannot  change 


70  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Evil:  continued. 

his  nature  and  his  habits  by  wishing,  but  is  simply 
himself,  and  will  ever  be  himself  and  what  he  now 
is,  or  at  least  that  pain  has  no  natural  tendency  to 
make  him  other  than  he  is,  and  that  the  longer  he 
lives,  the  more  difficult  he  is  to  change,  399-400; 
vide  Natural  Religion. 

"Ex  pede  Herculem,"  260. 

Experience:  it  often  happens  that  experience  is  a 
serviceable  help  in  determining  the  unknown,  espe- 
cially when  a  man  has  large  experiences  and  has 
learned  to  distinguish  between  them  and  apply 
them  duly,  27;  the  experience  of  one  man  is  not  the 
experience  of  another,  83;  various  of  the  experiences 
which  befall  this  man  may  be  the  same  as  those 
which  befall  that,  although  those  experiences  result 
each  from  the  combination  of  its  own  accidents, 
and  are  ultimately  traceable  each  to  its  own  special 
condition  or  history,  86  (vide  Individual);  no 
experience  indeed  of  life  can  assure  us  about  the 
future,  but  it  can  and  does  give  us  means  of  con- 
jecturing what  is  likely  to  be;  it  enables  us  to  ascer- 
tain the  moral  constitution  of  man,  and  thereby  to 
presage  his  future  from  his  present,  399. 

"Experientia  docet,"  12. 

Experimentalist  or  philosopher  aims  at  investigating, 
questioning,  ascertaining  facts,  causes,  effects,  actions, 
qualities :  these  are  things,  and  he  makes  his  words  dis- 
tinctly subordinate  to  these,  as  means  to  an  end,  20. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  71 

Experts,  —  vide  Detectives. 

Explanation  of  a  maze  of  facts,  —  vide  Maze. 

External  World:  that  there  are  things  existing  ex- 
ternal to  ourselves  is  a  first  principle,  and  one  of 
universal  reception;  it  is  founded  on  an  instinct; 
because  the  brute  creation  possesses  it;  this  instinct 
is  directed  towards  individual  phenomena,  one  by 
one,  and  has  nothing  of  the  character  of  a  gen- 
eralization; the  human  mind  lays  down  in  broad 
terms,  by  an  inductive  process,  the  great  aphorism, 
that  there  is  an  external  world,  and  that  all  the 
phenomena  of  sense  proceed  from  it;  this  general 
proposition  goes  far  beyond  our  experience,  and 
represents  a  notion,  61-2. 

Eye-Witness:  words  which  are  used  by  an  eye-wit- 
ness to  express  things,  unless  he  be  especially  elo- 
quent or  graphic,  may  only  convey  general  notions, 
33. 


Fabricius,  279. 

Factory  Girl,  Dying,  312. 

Facts:  intellectual  ideas  cannot  compete  in  effective- 
ness with  the  experience  of  concrete  facts,  12  (vide 
Concrete,  Language,  and  Mind);  we  are  in  a 
world  of  facts,  and  we  use  them;  for  there  is  nothing 
else  to  use,  346  (vide  Self)  ;  to  arrive  at  the  fact  of 
any  matter,  we  must  eschew  generalities,  and  take 
things  as  they  stand,  with  all  their  circumstances, 


72  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Facts:  continued. 

306;  facts  cannot  be  proved  by  presumptions,  383; 
vide  Informal  Inference. 

"Facts  are  stubborn  things/'  12. 

Faculty:  faculty  of  composition,  —  vide  Inventive 
Faculty;  ratiocinative  or  illative  faculty,  —  vide 
Ratiocinative  Faculty;  sometimes  our  trust  in 
our  powers  of  reasoning  and  memory,  that  is,  our 
implicit  assent  to  their  telling  truly,  is  treated  as  a 
first  principle;  but  we  cannot  properly  be  said  to 
have  any  trust  in  them  as  faculties;  at  most  we  trust 
in  particular  acts  of  memory  and  reasoning;  but,  in 
doing  so,  we  imply  no  recognition  of  a  general  power 
or  faculty;  we  gain  this  knowledge  by  abstraction 
or  inference  from  its  particular  acts,  not  by  direct 
experience;  nor  do  we  trust  in  the  faculty  of  memory 
or  reasoning  as  such,  for  its  acts  are  often  inaccurate, 
nor  do  we  invariably  assent  to  them,  60-1;  more- 
over, our  consciousness  of  self  is  prior  to  all  ques- 
tions of  trust  or  assent ;  we  are  as  little  able  to  accept 
or  reject  our  mental  constitution  as  our  being;  we 
have  not  the  option,  61,  346  (vide  Self). 

Faith:  to  say  "I  do  not  understand  a  proposition,  but 
I  accept  it  on  authority,"  is  faith;  it  is  not  a  direct 
assent  to  the  proposition,  still  it  is  an  assent  to  the 
authority  which  enunciates  it,  43;  faith,  in  its  theo- 
logical sense,  includes  a  belief,  not  only  in  the  thing 
believed,  but  also  in  the  ground  of  believing;  that 
is,  not  only  belief  in  certain  doctrines,  but  belief  in 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  73 

Faith:  continued. 

them  expressly  because  God  has  revealed  them, 
99-100;  the  pre-eminence  of  strength  in  divine 
faith  has  a  supernatm'al  origin;  it  consists,  not  in 
its  differing  from  human  faith,  merely  in  degree  of 
assent,  but  in  its  being  superior  in  nature  and  kind, 
so  that  the  one  does  not  admit  of  a  comparison  with 
the  other;  and  its  intrinsic  superiority  is  not  a  matter 
of  experience,  but  is  above  experience,  186-7;  vide 
Reason;  Rule  of  Faith,  —  vide  Rule  of  Faith. 

False  Teaching:  St.  Augustine  tells  us  there  is  no 
false  teaching  without  an  intermixture  of  truth,  249. 

Falstaff,  271. 

Feak:  to  fear  argument  is  to  doubt  the  conclusion, 
203;  vide  Truth. 

Fine  Arts:  invention  in  the  Fine  Arts,  —  vide  Taste; 
though  true  and  scientific  rules  may  be  given  in  the 
Fine  Arts,  no  one  would  therefore  deny  that  Phidias 
or  Rafael  had  a  far  more  subtle  standard  of  taste 
and  a  more  versatile  power  of  embodying  it  in  his 
works,  than  any  which  he  could  communicate  to 
others  in  even  a  series  of  treatises,  357-8;  genius  in 
the  Fine  Arts  is  indissolubly  united  to  one  definite 
subject-matter,  358. 

Firm  and  Weak  Assents,  184-6  (vide  Assent). 

First  Principles,  —  vide  Principles,  First. 

Formal  Inference:  formal  inference  is  ratiocination, 
restricted  and  put  into  grooves,  263  (vide  Reason- 
ing); it  is  verbal  reasoning,  of  whatever  kind,  as 


74  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Formal  Inference:  continued. 

opposed  to  mental,  263;  in  it  the  force  of  the  proof 
lies  in  the  comparison  of  the  propositions  with  each 
other;  when  the  analysis  is  carried  out  fully  and  put 
into  form,  it  becomes  the  Aristotelic  syllogism,  263; 
it  differs  from  logic  only  inasmuch  as  logic  is  its 
scientific  form,  264;  it  proposes  to  provide  both  a 
test  and  a  common  measure  of  reasoning;  and  in 
this  it  partly  succeeds  and  partly  fails,  264;  being 
conditional,  it  is  hampered  with  the  premisses  as 
well  as  the  conclusion,  and  with  the  rules  connecting 
the  latter  with  the  former;  it  is  practically  far  more 
concerned  with  the  comparison  of  propositions 
than  with  the  propositions  themselves;  the  more 
simple  and  definite  are  the  words  of  a  proposition, 
and  the  nearer  the  propositions  concerned  in  the 
inference  approach  to  being  mental  abstractions, 
and  the  less  they  have  to  do  with  the  concrete 
reality,  so  much  the  more  suitable  do  they  become 
for  the  purposes  of  inference,  264-5;  hence  it  is  that 
no  process  of  argument  is  so  perfect  as  that  which 
is  conducted  by  means  of  symbols,  as  in  Arithmetic, 
Algebra,  and  Geometry,  265-6;  it  is  the  aim  of  the 
syllogistic  method  to  circumscribe  and  stint  the 
import  of  the  words  it  uses  as  much  as  possible;  for 
the  concrete  matter  of  propositions  is  a  constant 
source  of  trouble  to  syllogistic  reasoning;  words 
which  denote  things  have  innumerable  implications, 
266-7;  to  the  logician  dog  or  horse  is  not  a  thing 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  75 

Formal  Inference:  continued. 

which  he  sees,  but  a  mere  name  suggesting  ideas; 
and  by  dog  or  horse  universal  he  means  a  common 
aspect,  meagre  but  precise,  of  all  existing  or  possible 
dogs  or  horses;  his  business  is  not  to  ascertain  facts 
in  the  concrete,  but  to  find  and  dress  up  middle 
terms,  267-8  (vide  Universals);  whereas  inference 
starts  with  conditions,  as  starting  with  premisses, 
here  are  two  reasons  why,  when  employed  upon 
questions  of  fact,  it  can  only  conclude  probabilities: 
first,  because  its  premisses  are  assumed,  not  proved; 
and  secondly,  because  its  conclusions  are  abstract, 
and  not  concrete,  268-9,  278,  284;  it  assumes  its 
premisses,  for  in  order  to  complete  the  proof  we 
are  thrown  upon  some  previous  syllogism  or  syl- 
logisms, in  which  the  assumptions  may  be  proved; 
but  we  never  arrive  at  premisses  which  are  unde- 
niable; for  it  lodges  us  at  length  at  what  are  called 
first  principles,  as  to  which  logic  provides  no  com- 
mon measure  of  minds,  —  w^hich  are  accepted  by 
some,  rejected  by  others,  269  (vide  Principles, 
First);  we  are  not  able  to  prove  by  syllogism  that 
there  are  any  self-evident  propositions  at  all;  but 
supposing  there  are,  we  cannot  determine  these  by 
logic,  270;  vide  Syllogism;  even  when  argument  is 
the  most  direct  and  severe  of  its  kind,  there  must 
be  those  assumptions  in  the  process  which  resolve 
themselves  into  the  conditions  of  human  nature; 
but  that  process  involves  many  more  assumptions 


76  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Formal  Inference:  continued. 

in  ordinary  concrete  matters,  which  are  traceable 
to  the  sentiments  of  the  age,  country,  religion,  social 
habits  and  ideas,  of  the  particular  inquirers  or  dis- 
putants; to  these  must  be  added  the  assumptions 
which  are  made  from  the  necessity  of  the  case,  in 
consequence  of  the  prolixity  and  elaborateness  of 
any  argument  w^hich  should  faithfully  note  down 
all  the  propositions  which  go  to  make  it  up,  270; 
this  doctrine  illustrated  by  a  discussion  of  the  words 
in  "  Henry  V,"  "  His  nose  was  as  sharp  as  a  pen,  and 
'a  babbled  of  green  fields,"  271-7;  an  inference, 
however  fully  worded  (except  perhaps  in  some 
peculiar  cases),  never  can  reach  so  far  as  to  ascertain 
a  fact,  278;  even  in  mathematical  physics  a  margin 
is  left  for  possible  imperfection  in  the  investigation, 
278;  no  one  would  be  satisfied  with  a  navigator  or 
engineer  who  had  no  practice  or  experience  whereby 
to  carry  on  his  scientific  conclusions  out  of  their 
native  abstract  into  the  concrete  and  the  real,  278 
(vide  Theorist);  vide  Universals,  and  Nature; 
all  inferential  processes  whatever,  as  expressed  in 
language,  require  general  notions,  as  conditions  of 
their  coming  to  a  conclusion,  283;  this  illustrated, 
283-4;  that  formal  reasonings  cannot  proceed  be- 
yond probabilities  is  most  readily  allowed  by  those 
who  use  them  most;  philosophers,  experimentalists, 
lawyers  speak  by  rule  and  by  book,  though  they 
judge  and   determine  by  common-sense,  285;  the 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  77 

FoR]VL\L  Inference:  continued. 

uses  of  logical  inference,  285-7;  it  is  the  great  prin- 
ciple of  order  in  our  thinking,  285-6;  it  supplies  us 
with  a  tangible  defence  of  what  we  hold,  and  gives  it 
luminousness  and  force;  it  thus  becomes  a  sort  of 
symbol  of  assent,  and  even  bears  upon  action,  286-7. 

Formalism  is  the  practice  of  asserting  simply  on 
authority,  with  the  pretence  and  without  the  reality 
of  assent,  43. 

Formative  Ideas  are  certain  original  forms  of  thinking, 
connatural  with  our  minds,  without  which  we  could 
not  reason  at  all,  64. 

France,  294. 

Free-Trade,  3,  5. 

Free-Trader,  85. 

French,  33,  199. 

Frenchmen,  33. 

"Fronti  nulla  fides,"  81. 

Function:  our  duty  is,  not  to  abstain  from  the  exer- 
cise of  any  function  of  our  nature,  but  to  do  what  is 
in  itself  right  rightly,  7;  it  is  enough  for  the  proof  of 
the  value  and  authority  of  any  function  which  I 
jjossess,  to  be  able  to  pronounce  that  it  is  natural, 
347  (vide  Act,  Self,  and  Man). 

Future:  no  experience  of  life  can  assure  us  about  the 
future,  but  it  can  and  does  give  us  means  of  con- 
jecturing what  is  likely  to  be;  experience  enables 
us  to  ascertain  the  moral  constitution  of  man,  and 
thereby  to  presage  his  future  from  his  present,  399. 


78  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OP 

G 

Gabriel,  Angel,  449. 

Gambier,  on  Moral  Evidence,  174. 

Gassendi,  287  note. 

Genesis:  quoted,  441-2. 

Genius:  instances  of  genius  as  displayed  in  natural 
inference,  333-4,  380;  genius,  as  far  as  it  is  mani- 
fested in  ratiocination,  is  not  equal  to  all  under- 
takings, but  has  its  own  peculiar  subject-matter, 
and  is  circumscribed  in  its  range,  338-9. 

Gentiles:  the  Expectation  of  the  Gentiles,  485. 

Geometry:  262,  266;  vide  Algebra. 

Germanicus,  481. 

Germany,  325. 

Gibbon:  373;  Gibbon  has  mentioned  five  human 
causes  by  way  of  explaining  the  rise  and  establish- 
ment of  Christianity,  viz.,  the  zeal  of  the  Christians, 
inherited  from  the  Jews,  their  doctrine  of  a  future 
state,  their  claim  to  miraculous  power,  their  virtues, 
and  their  ecclesiastical  organization,  457;  but  even 
though  these  presumed  causes,  when  combined, 
accounted  for  the  event,  it  would  still  remain  to 
show  out  of  what  that  combination  arose,  and  this 
Gibbon  has  not  done,  457-8  (vide  Wonderful,  and 
Law)  ;  moreover,  these  five  historical  characteristics 
of  Christianity  neither  did  effect  what  Gibbon  claims 
they  did,  i.e.,  the  conversion  of  bodies  of  men  to  the 
Christian  faith,  nor  were  they  adapted  to  do  so, 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  79 

Gibbon:  continued. 

458-9;  for  (1)  zeal,  by  which  Gibbon  means  party 
spirit,  is  a  motive  principle  when  men  are  already 
members  of  a  body,  but  it  does  not  operate  in  bring- 
ing them  into  it;  (2)  the  doctrine  of  a  future  state, 
by  which  Gibbon  seems  to  mean  the  fear  of  hell, 
converts  only  those  persons  from  sin  to  a  religious 
life  who  already  believe  in  the  doctrine,  and  the 
belief  in  Styx  and  Tartarus  was  dying  out  of  the 
world  at  the  time  that  Christianity  came  in;  and 
the  hope  of  eternal  life  was  operative  only  in  the 
case  of  men  who  had  been  actually  converted;  (3) 
the  claim  to  miraculous  power  on  the  part  of  the 
Christians  was  so  unfrequent  (for  the  heathens  had 
plenty  of  portents  of  their  own)  as  to  become  now 
an  objection  to  the  fact  of  their  possessing  it;  (4)  on 
Gibbon's  own  confession,  the  heathen  viewed  with 
disgust  the  moral  and  social  bearing  of  the  Chris- 
tians; (5)  ecclesiastical  organization  gave  strength 
to  Christianity,  but  it  did  not  give  it  life;  it  is  one 
thing  to  make  conquests,  another  to  consolidate  an 
empire;  it  was  before  Constantine  that  Christians 
made  their  great  conquests;  besides,  even  now  the 
Church  suspends  her  diocesan  administration  and 
her  Canon  Law  in  heathen  countries  and  in  countries 
which  have  thrown  off  her  yoke,  459-62;  465,  476, 
480,  483. 

Gibson,  Bishop  of  London:  quoted,  429. 

"Give  to  him  that  asketh  thee,"  37. 


80  ^A^  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

"Go  and  make  disciples  of  all  nations,"  etc.,  451. 

"Go  into  the  world  and  preach  the  Gospel  to  every 
creature,"  451. 

God:  it  may  be  unmeaning,  not  only  to  number  the 
Supreme  Being  with  other  beings,  but  to  subject 
Him  to  number  in  regard  to  His  own  intrinsic  char- 
acteristics, 50;  the  word  "Trinity"  belongs  to  those 
notions  of  Him  which  are  forced  on  us  by  the  neces- 
sity of  our  finite  conceptions,  the  real  and  immutable 
distinction  which  exists  between  Person  and  Person 
implying  in  itself  no  infringement  of  His  real  and 
numerical  Unity,  50;  He  is  not  One  in  the  way  in 
which  created  things  are  severally  units;  of  the 
Supreme  Being  it  is  safer  to  use  the  word  "  monad  " 
than  unit,  51 ;  Providence  of  God,  —  vide  Provi- 
dence; Infinitude  of  God,  —  vide  Mystery;  Omni- 
presence of  God,  —  vide  Omnipresence;  belief  in 
One  God,  101-21  (vide  Conscience)  ;  description  of 
God,  101 ;  the  assent  of  Theists  to  the  Being  of  a  God 
admits  without  difficulty  of  being  a  notional  assent; 
yet  a  real  assent  to  this  truth  is  possible  to  us,  101-2; 
the  proposition  that  there  is  One  Personal  and 
Present  God  may  be  held  either  as  a  theological 
truth,  or  as  a  religious  fact  or  reality;  when  the 
proposition  is  apprehended  for  the  purposes  of 
proof,  analysis,  comparison,  etc.,  it  is  used  as  the 
expression  of  a  notion;  when  for  the  purposes  of 
devotion,  it  is  the  image  of  a  reality,  119  (vide 
Religion);  the  One  Personal  God  is  not  a  logical 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  81 

God:  continued. 

or  physical  unity,  but  a  Living  Monas,  more  really 
one  even  than  an  individual  man  is  one,  125;  "There 
is  a  God,"  when  really  apprehended,  is  the  object 
of  a  strong  energetic  adhesion,  which  works  a  revo- 
lution in  the  mind ;  but  when  held  merely  as  a  notion, 
it  requires  but  a  cold  and  ineffective  acceptance, 
though  it  be  held  ever  so  unconditionally,  126;  not 
only  do  we  see  God  at  best  only  in  shadows,  but  we 
cannot  bring  even  those  shadows  together;  our 
image  of  Him  never  is  one,  but  broken  into  number- 
less partial  aspects,  independent  each  of  each;  as 
we  cannot  see  the  whole  starry  firmament  at  once, 
so  it  is,  and  much  more,  with  such  real  apprehensions 
as  we  can  secure  of  the  Divine  Nature;  we  can  com- 
bine the  various  matters  which  we  know  of  Him  by 
an  act  of  the  intellect,  and  treat  them  theologically, 
but  such  theological  combinations  are  no  objects 
for  the  imagination  to  gaze  upon;  moreover,  our 
devotion  is  tried  and  confused  by  the  long  list  of 
propositions  which  theology  is  obliged  to  draw  up, 
131;  these  propositions  are  necessary  not  so  much 
for  faith,  as  against  unbelief,  132;  ordinarily  speak- 
ing, abstract  arguments  for  the  Attributes  of  God 
have  not  their  true  force,  except  according  as  the 
Image,  presented  to  us  through  conscience,  on 
which  they  depend,  is  cherished  within  us  with  the 
sentiments  which  it  necessarily  claims  of  us,  and  is 
seen  reflected,  by  the  habit  of  our  intellect,  in  the 


82  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

God:  continued. 

appointments  and  the  events  of  the  external  world, 
314-15. 

'^  God  heareth  not  sinners;  but  if  a  man  be  a  worshipper 
of  God,"  etc.,  407. 

"God  is  faithful,  as  our  preaching  which  was  among 
you,"  etc.,  141. 

Good  is  the  rule,  and  evil  the  exception,  117;  good  to 
the  good,  and  evil  to  the  evil,  is  instinctively  felt 
to  be,  even  from  what  we  see,  amid  whatever  ob- 
scurity and  confusion,  the  universal  rule  of  God's 
dealings  with  us,  402. 

Good  Sense  is  the  healthy  condition  of  the  living 
personal  reasoning,  300. 

GORGONIUS,   484. 

Gospels,  from  their  subject,  contain  a  manifestation 
of  the  Divine  Nature,  so  special,  as  to  make  it  appear 
from  the  contrast  as  if  nothing  were  known  of  God, 
when  they  are  unknown,  119;  vide  Scripture. 

Goths,  376. 

Government:  there  has  been  a  conflict  of  first  prin- 
ciples as  to  whether  government  and  legislation 
ought  to  be  of  a  religious  character,  or  not ;  whether 
the  state  has  a  conscience;  whether  Christianity  is 
the  law  of  the  land ;  whether  the  magistrate,  in  pun- 
ishing offenders,  exercises  a  retributive  office  or  a 
corrective;  or  whether  the  whole  structure  of 
society  is  raised  upon  the  basis  of  secular  expe- 
diency, 379. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  83 

GRMIMAR  OF  ASSENT:  the  Grammar  of  Assent 
treats  of  propositions  only  in  their  bearing  upon  con- 
crete matter;  it  is  mainly  concerned  with  Assent; 
with  Inference,  in  its  relation  to  Assent,  and  only 
such  inference  as  is  not  demonstration,  7;  it  treats 
of  the  distinctions  in  the  use  of  propositions,  and  of 
the  questions  which  those  distinctions  involve,  12; 
its  object  is,  not  to  form  a  theory  which  may  account 
for  those  phenomena  of  the  intellect  of  which  it 
treats,  viz.,  those  which  characterize  inference  and 
assent,  but  to  ascertain  what  is  the  matter  of  fact 
as  regards  them,  that  is,  when  it  is  that  assent  is 
given  to  propositions  which  are  inferred,  and  under 
what  circumstances,  343;  its  aim  is  of  a  practical 
character,  such  as  that  of  Butler  in  his  Analogy,  and 
it  is  confined  to  the  truth  of  things,  and  to  the  mind's 
certitude  of  that  truth,  344;  it  is  addressed,  not  to 
controversialists,  but  to  inquirers,  425;  a  main 
reason  for  Newman's  writing  it  was,  as  far  as  he 
could,  to  describe  the  organum  investigandi,  which 
he  thought  the  true  one,  given  us  for  gaining  re- 
ligious truth,  499. 

Grammarian:  language  is  notional  in  the  grammarian; 
he  has  to  determine  the  force  of  words  and  phrases; 
he  has  to  master  the  structure  of  sentences  and  the 
composition  of  paragraphs;  he  has  to  compare  lan- 
guage with  language,  to  ascertain  the  common  ideas 
expressed  under  different  idiomatic  forms,  and  to 
achieve  the  difficult  work  of  recasting  the  mind  of 


84  ^A^  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Grammarian:  continued. 

the  original  author  in  the  mould  of  a  translation, 
20. 

Great  Britain:  181,  189,  190,  198;  our  certitude  of 
the  insularity  of  Great  Britain  is  gained  by  informal 
inference,  294-6. 

Greece:  303,  304,  363,  475;  Greece  is  the  home  of 
intellectual  power,  432. 

Greek:  the  old  Greek  and  Roman  polytheists  had,  as 
they  show  in  their  literature,  clear  and  strong  no- 
tions, nay,  vivid  mental  images,  of  a  Particular 
Providence,  of  the  power  of  prayer,  of  the  rule  of 
Divine  Governance,  of  the  law  of  conscience,  of  sin 
and  guilt,  of  expiation  by  means  of  sacrifice,  and  of 
future  retribution,  and  even  of  the  Unity  and  Per- 
sonality of  the  Supreme  Being,  250. 

Greek  Christian:  an  anonymous  Greek  Christian 
quoted,  472-4. 

Greeks,  473,  474,  475. 

Grote,  Mr.,  364,  365,  366,  367,  368,  369,  371  note. 

Growth  of  Assent,  185;  vide  Assent. 

Guardian:  quoted,  333. 

H 

"Had  no  oil  in  their  vessels,"  455. 

Hagiographa,  118-19. 

Half-Assent:  a  half-assent  is  not  a  kind  of  assent  any 
more  than  a  half-truth  is  a  kind  of  truth;  as  the 
object  is  indivisible,  so  is  the  act,  175;  to  give  a  half- 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  85 

Half- Assent:  continued. 

assent  is  to  feel  drawn  towards  assent,  or  to  assent 
one  moment  and  not  the  next,  or  to  be  in  the  way 
to  assent;  it  means  that  the  proposition  in  question 
deserves  a  hearing,  176;  it  is  an  inclination  to  assent, 
or  again,  an  intention  of  assenting,  when  certain 
difficulties  are  surmounted,  182. 

Half-Truth  is  not  a  kind  of  truth;  it  is  a  proposition 
which  in  one  aspect  is  a  truth,  and  in  another  is  not, 
175-6. 

Hallahan,  Mother  Margaret  M.,  Life  of:  quoted, 
335. 

Hannibal,  50. 

Hardouin,  Father,  maintained  that  Terence's  Plays, 
Virgil's  "^neid,"  Horace's  Odes,  and  the  histories 
of  Livy  and  Tacitus,  were  the  forgeries  of  the  monks 
of  the  thirteenth  century,  296;  but  he  allows  that 
the  Georgics,  Horace's  Satires  and  Epistles,  and  the 
whole  of  Cicero  are  genuine,  297. 

Harvey,  276. 

"He  left  not  Himself  without  testimony,"  etc.,  401. 

"He  that  hath  ears,  let  him  hear,"  415. 

"He  that  is  of  God,  heareth  the  words  of  God,"  415. 

"He  that  knoweth  God,  heareth  us,"  etc.,  415. 

"He  that  made  the  world"  "now  declareth  to  all  men 
to  do  penance,"  etc.,  388. 

"  He  that  shall  persevere  to  the  end,  he  shall  be  saved," 
452. 

Hearing:  all  men,  as  time  goes  on,  have  the  prospect 


86  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Hearing:  continued. 

of  losing  that  keenness  of  sight  and  hearing  which 
they  possessed  in  their  youth;  and  so,  in  like  manner, 
we  may  lose  in  manhood  and  in  age  that  sense  of  a 
Supreme  Teacher  and  Judge  which  was  the  gift  of 
our  first  years,  123. 

Heart:  the  heart  is  commonly  reached,  not  through 
the  reason,  but  through  the  imagination,  by  means 
of  direct  impressions,  by  the  testimony  of  facts  and 
events,  by  history,  by  description;  persons  influence 
us,  voices  melt  us,  looks  subdue  us,  deeds  inflame  us, 
92-3  (vide  Affections);  vide  Syllogism. 

Hebrew  Nation,  432;  vide  Jews. 

Heresies:  three  of  the  early  heresies  more  or  less 
originated  in  obstinate,  unchristian  refusal  to  re- 
admit to  the  privileges  of  the  Gospel  those  who  had 
fallen  into  sin,  455;  vide  Dogmatic  Theology. 

Herod,  37. 

Herodotus,  250. 

Hesiod:  quoted,  342. 

Hesitating  Assent  is  an  assent  to  which  we  have 
been  slow  and  intermittent  in  coming;  or  an  assent 
which,  when  given,  is  thwarted  and  obscured  by  ex- 
ternal and  flitting  misgivings,  though  not  such  as  to 
enter  into  the  act  itself,  or  essentially  to  damage  it; 
we  also  speak  of  a  hesitating  or  uncertain  assent, 
when  we  assent  in  act,  but  not  in  the  habit  of  our 
minds;  till  assent  to  a  doctrine  or  fact  is  my  habit,  I 
am  at  the  mercy  of  inferences  contrary  to  it,  183-4. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  87 

"His  hand  is  not  shortened,"  etc.,  398. 
"His  nose  was  as  sharp  as  a  pen,"  etc.,  271. 
History  of  Turks,  Newman's,  396  note. 

HOHENZOLLERN,    456. 

Holy  Land,  219. 

Holy  Spirit:  135,  140;  as  the  child  issues  in  the  man  as 
his  quasi  successor,  and  the  child  and  the  man  issue 
in  the  old  man,  like  them  both,  but  not  the  same, 
so  different  as  almost  to  have  a  fresh  personality 
distinct  from  each,  so  we  may  form  some  image, 
however  vague,  of  the  procession  of  the  Holy  Spirit 
from  Father  and  Son,  136. 

Holy  Trinity:  it  is  the  belief  of  Catholics  about  the 
Supreme  Being,  that  this  essential  characteristic 
of  His  Nature  [i.e..  Personality]  is  reiterated  in  three 
distinct  ways  or  modes;  so  that  the  Almighty  God, 
instead  of  being  One  Person  only,  which  is  the 
teaching  of  Natural  Religion,  has  Three  Personal- 
ities, 125;  exposition  of  the  doctrine  of  the  Holy 
Trinity,  124-5;  the  Catholic  dogma  may  be  summed 
up  in  this  formula,  "Tres  et  Unus,"  hence  that 
formula  is  the  key-note  of  the  Athanasian  Creed, 
125;  this  doctrine  is  of  a  notional  character,  126; 
but  it  admits  of  being  held  in  the  imagination,  and 
being  embraced  with  a  real  assent,  and  this  is  the 
normal  faith  which  every  Christian  has,  on  which 
he  is  stayed,  which  is  his  spiritual  life,  127;  the 
words  used  in  the  exposition  of  the  doctrine,  viz., 
Personal,  Three,  One,  He,  God,  Father,  Son,  Spirit, 


88  ^A^  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Holy  Trinity:  continued. 

are  none  of  them  words  peculiar  to  theology,  have 
all  a  popular  meaning,  and  are  used  according  to 
that  obvious  and  popular  meaning,  when  introduced 
into  the  Catholic  dogma;  they  are  among  the  sim- 
plest and  most  intelligible  that  are  to  be  found  in 
language,  127;  they  stand  for  things,  and  are  em- 
bodied in  simple,  clear,  brief,  categorical  proposi- 
tions, 127-8;  not  even  the  words  "  mysteriousness " 
and  "mystery"  occur  in  the  exposition;  they  are 
not  parts  of  the  Divine  Verity  as  such,  but  in  rela- 
tion to  creatures  and  to  the  human  intellect;  the 
thesis  "  the  doctrine  of  the  Holy  Trinity  in  Unity  is 
mysterious"  is  indirectly  an  article  of  faith;  but 
such  an  article,  being  a  reflection  made  upon  a 
revealed  truth  in  an  inference,  expresses  a  notion, 
not  a  thing;  it  does  not  relate  to  the  direct  appre- 
hension of  the  object,  but  to  a  judgment  of  our 
reason  upon  the  object,  128;  strictly  speaking,  the 
dogma  of  the  Holy  Trinity,  as  a  complex  whole,  or 
as  a  mystery,  is  not  the  formal  object  of  religious 
apprehension  and  assent;  but  as  it  is  a  number  of 
propositions,  taken  one  by  one;  that  complex  whole 
also  is  the  object  of  assent,  but  it  is  the  notional 
object,  129;  a  real  assent  to  the  mystery,  as  such,  is 
not  possible,  because,  though  we  can  image  the 
separate  propositions,  we  cannot  image  them  alto- 
gether, since  the  mystery  transcends  all  our  expe- 
rience, 130  (vide  God);  break  a  ray  of  light  into  its 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  89 

Holy  Trinity:  continued. 

constituent  colours,  each  is  beautiful,  each  may  be 
enjoyed;  attempt  to  unite  them,  and  perhaps  you 
produce  only  a  dirty  white;  the  pure  and  indivisible 
Light  is  seen  only  by  the  blessed  inhabitants  of 
heaven;  here  we  have  but  such  faint  reflections  of 
it  as  its  diffraction  supplies;  but  they  are  sufficient 
for  faith  and  devotion,  132;  the  Holy  Trinity  in 
Unity  is  never  spoken  of  as  a  Mystery  in  the  sacred 
book,  or  in  the  Creeds,  132  (vide  Scripture,  and 
Athanasian  Creed);  or  in  the  definitions  of  the 
Church,  134;  but  it  is  so  spoken  of  in  catechisms 
and  theological  treatises,  134;  the  dogma  consists 
of  nine  propositions,  each  of  which  admits  of  a  real 
apprehension,  135;  every  chapter  of  St.  John  and 
St.  Paul  is  full  of  the  Three  Divine  Names,  137;  the 
New  Testament  is  ever  ringing  the  changes  on  the 
nine  propositions,  138  (vide  "The  Son  is  God,"  and 
"The  Holy  Ghost  is  God");  theology  has  to  do  with 
the  Dogma  of  the  Holy  Trinity  as  a  whole  made  up 
of  many  propositions;  but  Religion  has  to  do  with 
each  of  those  separate  propositions  which  compose 
it,  140;  the  importance  of  accepting  the  dogma  is 
the  very  explanation  of  that  careful  minuteness 
with  which  the  few  simple  truths  which  compose  it 
are  inculcated,  are  reiterated,  in  the  Athanasian 
Creed,  141. 

Homer,  78,  277. 

Homeric  Poems,  250. 


90  ^A^  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Hooker,  276,  494. 

Horace,  78,  296,  297,  308. 

Humanitarian,  246. 

Hume:  47,  81  (vide  Miracles);  quoted,  306. 

Hunt,  —  vide  Search. 

I 

"I  am  the  Good  Shepherd,"  etc.,  492. 

"I  am  the  least  of  the  i^postles,"  etc.,  466. 

"I  believe,  help  my  unbelief,"  185,  220. 

*'  I  determined  to  know  nothing  among  you,  but  Jesus 
Christ,"  etc.,  466. 

"I  have  understood  more  than  all  my  teachers,"  etc., 
415. 

"  I  live,  but  now  not  I,"  etc.,  466. 

"I  make  known  to  you  the  gospel  which  I  preached 
to  you,"  etc.,  466. 

"  I  will  make  of  thee  a  great  nation,"  etc.,  441-2. 

"  I  will  pray  the  Father,  and  He  will  send  you  another 
Paraclete,"  137. 

Idea,  —  vide  Image,  and  Notion. 

Idea  of  a   University,  Newman's,  396  note. 

Ideas,  Formative,  —  vide  Formative  Ideas. 

Idolaters:  not  even  are  idolaters  and  heathen  out  of 
the  range  of  some  religious  truths  and  their  correla- 
tive certitudes,  250. 

"If  any  man  will  do  His  will,"  etc.,  415. 

Ignatius,  disciple  of  the  Apostles:  480;  quoted,  479. 

Illative  Faculty,  —  vide  Ratiocinative  Faculty. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  91 

Illative  Sense:  the  Illative  Sense  is  right  judgment 
in  ratiocination,  342;  it  is  the  perfection  or  virtue 
of  the  ratiocinative  faculty,  345;  it  is  the  power  of 
judging  and  concluding,  when  in  its  perfection,  353; 
it  is  the  reasoning  faculty,  as  exercised  by  gifted, 
or  by  educated  or  otherwise  well-prepared  minds, 
361 ;  sanction  of  the  illative  sense,  —  vide  Self, 
Being,  and  Man;  illustrated  by  reference  to  parallel 
faculties,  by  which  the  mind  exercises  supreme 
direction  and  control  (1)  in  matters  of  conduct, 
353-6,  —  (2)  in  the  various  callings  and  professions, 
357,  —  (3)  in  the  Fine  Arts,  357-8,  —  (4)  in  the 
useful  arts  and  personal  accomplishments,  358  (vide 
Conduct,  Professions,  Fine  Arts,  and  Useful 
Arts)  ;  in  all  of  these  separate  actions  of  the  intellect 
the  individual  is  supreme,  and  responsible  to  him- 
self, nay,  under  circumstances,  may  be  justified  in 
opposing  himself  to  the  judgment  of  the  whole 
world,  353;  ratiocination,  then,  should  not  be  an 
exception  to  a  general  law  which  attaches  to  the 
intellectual  exercises  of  the  mind,  or  be  held  to  be 
commensurate  with  logical  science,  358  (vide  Logic)  ; 
the  illative  sense,  viewed  in  its  exercise,  is  one  and 
the  same  in  all  concrete  matters,  though  employed 
in  them  in  different  measures;  we  do  not  reason  in 
one  way  in  chemistry  or  law,  in  another  in  morals 
or  religion;  but  in  reasoning  on  any  subject  what- 
ever, which  is  concrete,  we  proceed,  as  far  as  we  can, 
by  the  logic  of  language,  but  we  are  obliged  to  sup- 


92  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Illative  Sense:  continued. 

plement  it  by  the  more  subtle  and  elastic  logic  of 
thought;  for  forms  by  themselves  prove  nothing, 
358-9;  it  is  attached  to  definite  subject-matters,  359 
(vide  Natural  Inference);  in  coming  to  its  con- 
clusion, it  proceeds  always  in  the  same  way,  by  a 
method  of  reasoning,  which  is  the  elementary  prin- 
ciple of  the  mathematical  calculus  of  modern  times, 
359  (vide  Informal  Inference);  vide  Criterion, 
and  Mind;  it  has  its  function  in  the  beginning, 
middle,  and  end  of  all  verbal  discussion  and  inquiry, 
and  in  every  step  of  the  process,  361,  362;  it  is  a  rule 
to  itself,  and  appeals  to  no  judgment  beyond  its  own, 
361-2;  being  nothing  else  than  a  personal  gift  or 
acquisition,  it  supplies  no  common  measure  between 
mind  and  mind,  362;  its  presence  and  action  in  the 
conduct  of  an  argument  described,  363-4,  and 
illustrated  by  the  views  upon  the  state  of  Greece 
and  Rome  during  the  prehistoric  period  put  forth 
respectively  by  Niebuhr,  F.  W.  Newman,  Clinton, 
Lewis,  Grote,  and  Mure,  365-71;  these  authors 
differ  so  much  from  each  other  in  their  estimate  of 
the  testimonies  and  of  the  facts,  because  that  esti- 
mate is  simply  their  own,  coming  of  their  own  judg- 
ment, and  that  judgment  coming  of  assumptions  of 
their  own,  explicit  or  implicit,  and  those  assumptions 
spontaneously  issuing  out  of  the  state  of  thought 
respectively  belonging  to  each  of  them,  and  all  these 
successive  processes  of  minute  reasoning  superin- 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  93 

Illative  Sense:  continued. 
tended  and  directed  by  an  intellectual  instrument 
far  too  subtle  and  spiritual  to  be  scientific,  364;  the 
exercise  of  the  illative  sense  in  relation  to  first  prin- 
ciples illustrated,  371-83;  vide  Statement  of  the 
Case,  Assumptions,  and  Antecedent  Reasons. 

Image:  [this  word  is  used  repeatedly  in  the  Grammar 
of  Assent  in  the  sense  of  a  real  proposition];  an  im- 
age is  an  impression  left  by  things  on  the  imagina- 
tion, 75;  it  represents  the  concrete,  89;  no  description, 
however  complete,  could  convey  to  my  mind  an 
image  of  a  melody  or  a  mental  fact,  of  which  I  had 
no  direct  experience,  28  (vide  Inventive  Faculty)  ; 
images  need  not  be  true,  76;  the  fact  of  the  distinct- 
ness of  the  images,  which  are  required  for  real  assent, 
is  no  warrant  for  the  existence  of  the  objects  which 
those  images  represent,  80;  that  I  have  no  expe- 
rience of  a  thing  happening  except  in  one  way,  is  a 
cause  of  the  intensity  of  my  assent,  if  I  assent,  but 
not  a  reason  for  my  assenting,  81;  accidentally  im- 
pressiveness  does  constitute  the  motive  principle 
of  belief;  for  some  men  possess  an  idiosyncratic 
sagacity,  which  really  and  rightly  sees  reasons  in 
impressions  which  common  men  cannot  see,  and  is 
secured  from  the  peril  of  confusing  truth  with  make- 
belief,  81-2;  images  have  the  power  of  the  concrete 
upon  the  affections  and  passions,  and  by  means  of 
these  indirectly  become  operative;  still  this  practical 
influence  is  not  invariable,  nor  to  be  relied  on;  for 


94  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Image:  continued. 

given  images  may  have  no  tendency  to  affect  given 
minds,  or  to  excite  them  to  action,  89  (vide  Real 
Assent);  the  mere  acquisition  of  new  images,  and 
those  images  striking,  great,  various,  unexpected, 
beautiful,  is  highly  pleasurable,  quite  independently 
of  the  question  whether  there  is  any  truth  in  them, 
205-6 ;  the  Thought  or  Image  of  Christ  in  the  minds 
of  His  subjects  is  the  vivifying  idea  both  of  the 
Christian  body  and  of  the  individuals  in  it,  464-92 
(vide  Christianity,  and  Individual). 

Imagination:  the  natural  and  rightful  effect  of  acts 
of  the  imagination  upon  us  is,  not  to  create  assent, 
but  to  intensify  it,  82;  strictly  speaking,  it  is  not 
imagination  that  causes  action;  but  hope  and  fear, 
likes  and  dislikes,  appetite,  passion,  affection,  the 
stirrings  of  selfishness  and  self-love;  what  the  imagi- 
nation does  for  us  is  to  find  a  means  of  stimulating 
those  motive  powers;  and  it  does  so  by  providing  a 
supply  of  objects  strong  enough  to  stimulate  them, 
82;  the  imagination  may  be  said  in  some  sense  to 
be  of  a  practical  nature,  inasmuch  as  it  leads  to 
practice  indirectly  by  the  action  of  its  object  upon 
the  affections,  83,  89  (vide  Affections,  and  Real 
Assent);  in  most  men  the  imagination  suffers  from 
the  lapse  of  time  and  the  experience  of  life,  long 
before  the  bodily  senses  fail,  123;  vide  Reason,  and 
Religion;  assent  to  a  real  proposition  is  assent  to 
an  imagination,  214. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  95 

Immaculate  Conception,  248. 

"Immutable  things  in  which  it  is  impossible  for  God 
to  lie/'  239. 

Implicit  Assumptions,  —  vide  Assumptions. 

Impurity,  —  vide  Sin. 

"  In  thee  and  in  thy  seed  shall  all  the  tribes  of  the  earth 
be  blessed,"  442. 

"In  thy  seed  shall  all  the  nations  of  the  earth  be 
blessed,"  442. 

Incarnation,  219. 

Incompatible  Notions,  —  vide  Notion. 

Incomprehensible  and  inconceivable,  46. 

Inconceivable:  an  alleged  fact  is  not  therefore  im- 
possible because  it  is  inconceivable,  51  (vide  Notion). 

Indefectibility  :  indefectibility  almost  enters  into 
the  very  idea  of  certitude,  221;  statement  of  the 
case  against  indefectibility  of  certitude,  222-4,  228; 
vide  Certitude;  objection  against  it  in  the  primary 
truths  of  religion,  drawn  (1)  from  the  fact  that 
Catholicism  is  not  universally  received,  (2)  from 
the  multitude  of  men  who  change  their  religion,  241 ; 
(1)  is  not  valid,  for  a  truth  or  a  fact  may  be  certain, 
though  it  is  not  generally  received;  we  are  each  of 
us  ever  gaining  through  our  senses  various  cer- 
tainties, which  no  one  shares  with  us;  again,  cer- 
tainties of  science  are  in  the  possession  of  a  few 
countries  only,  and  for  the  most  part  only  of  the 
educated  classes  of  those  countries,  242  (vide 
Church);  (2)  is  not  valid,  for  to  accept  a  religion 


96  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Indefectibility:  continued. 

is  neither  a  simple  assent  to  it  nor  a  complex,  but 
it  is  a  collection  of  various  kinds  of  assents,  among 
which  there  may  be  very  few  certitudes,  and  be- 
sides, there  are  few  religions  which  have  no  points 
in  common,  243-51  (vide  Assent,  and  Protestant); 
vide  Religion,  St.  Paul,  Jews,  Anglicans,  Chris- 
tians, and  Philosophers;  indefectibility  may  serve 
as  a  negative  test  of  certitude,  or  sine  qua  non 
condition,  256  (vide  Criterion);  the  indefectibility 
of  certitude  is  not  discredited  by  the  sight  of  a  dead 
man  come  to  life  again;  but  in  such  case  we  have 
two  certitudes,  one  of  his  death,  and  the  other  of 
his  return  to  life,  256;  it  is  not  affected  by  the  di- 
verse accounts  of  Revelation  and  Science  concerning 
the  origin  of  man;  for  I  should  never  give  up  my 
certitude  in  that  truth  which  on  sufficient  grounds 
I  determined  to  come  from  heaven,  257;  prejudice 
may  be  indefectible;  but  it  cannot  be  confused  with 
certitude,  for  the  one  is  an  assent  previous  to  ra- 
tional grounds,  and  the  other  an  assent  given  ex- 
pressly after  careful  examination,  258  (vide  Cer- 
titude). 

India,  189,  190,  393,  453. 

Indians,  Red,  376. 

Individual:  real  assents  are  of  a  personal  character, 
each  individual  having  his  own,  and  being  known 
by  them,  83-7  (vide  Assent,  Notional  and  Real)  ; 
the  characteristics  of  an  individual  are  accidents, 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  97 

Individual:  continued. 

because  they  are  severally  the  co-incidents  of  many 
laws,  and  there  are  no  laws  as  yet  discovered  of  such 
coincidence;  this  illustrated  by  the  example  of  a 
man  who  is  run  over  in  the  street  and  killed;  it  does 
not  meet  the  case  to  refer  to  the  law  of  averages,  for 
such  laws  deal  with  percentages,  not  with  individ- 
uals, 84;  illustrations  of  the  characteristics  of  an 
individual  and  of  the  laws  of  his  nature,  85-6; 
various  of  the  experiences  which  befall  this  man 
may  be  the  same  as  those  which  befall  that, 
although  those  experiences  result  each  from  the 
combination  of  its  own  accidents,  and  are  ultimately 
traceable  each  to  its  own  special  condition  or  history; 
this  illustrated  by  the  instance  of  men  who  cannot 
live  out  of  Madeira,  and  of  the  belief  of  so  many 
thousands  in  our  Lord's  Divinity,  86-7;  vide  Real 
Assents;  even  when  such  belief  has  one  single 
origin,  as  the  study  of  Scripture,  careful  teaching, 
or  a  religious  temper,  still  its  presence  argues  a 
special  history,  and  a  personal  formation,  which  an 
abstraction  does  not,  87. 

Infallibility:  a  certitude  is  directed  to  this  or  that 
particular  proposition;  it  is  not  a  faculty  or  gift,  but 
a  disposition  of  mind  relatively  to  a  definite  case 
which  is  before  me:  infallibility,  on  the  contrary,  is 
a  faculty  or  gift,  and  relates,  not  to  some  one  truth 
in  particular,  but  to  all  possible  propositions  in  a 
given    subject-matter,    224,    227;    this    distinction 


98  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Infallibility:  continued. 

illustrated,  225-7;  Chillingworth's  mistake  as  re- 
gards this  distinction,  226-7,  493;  infallibility  of  the 
Church,  —  vide  Church. 

Inference:  vide  Proposition,  and  Reasoning;  infer- 
ence is  the  conditional  acceptance  of  a  proposition, 
8,  59,  75,  157,  172,  189,  259;  for  it  is  the  accept- 
ance of  a  proposition  on  the  condition  of  an  accept- 
ance of  its  premisses,  75;  when  we  infer,  we  consider 
a  proposition  in  relation  to  other  propositions, 
13;  formal  inference,  —  vide  Formal  Inference; 
informal  inference,  —  vide  Informal  Inference; 
natural  inference,  —  vide  Natural  Inference; 
inference  and  assent,  —  vide  Assent  and  Infer- 
ence; inference  and  opinion,  —  vide  Opinion;  in- 
ference is  ever  varying  in  strength,  38  (vide  Assent 
AND  Inference);  the  apprehension  which  accom- 
panies acts  of  inference  is  notional,  39;  inference  is 
engaged  for  the  most  part  on  notional  propositions, 
both  premiss  and  conclusion,  39;  when  inferences 
are  employed  on  mere  symbols,  they  are  clearest 
and  most  cogent ;  the  next  clearest  are  such  as  carry 
out  the  necessary  results  of  previous  classifications, 
and  therefore  may  be  called  definitions  or  conclu- 
sions, as  we  please,  39-40;  processes  of  inference, 
however  accurate,  can  end  in  mystery,  46  (vide 
Mystery);  it  is  in  its  nature  and  by  its  profession 
conditional  and  uncertain,  59;  it  requires  no  appre- 
hension of  the  things  inferred;  it  is  concerned  with 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  99 

Inference:  continued. 
surfaces  and  aspects;  it  does  not  reach  as  far  as 
facts;  it  is  employed  upon  formulas;  as  far  as  it 
takes  real  objects  of  whatever  kind  into  account,  it 
deals  with  them,  not  as  they  are,  but  simply  as  ma- 
terials of  argument  or  inquiry;  they  are  to  it  nothing 
more  than  major  and  minor  premisses  and  con- 
clusions, 90  (vide  Science,  Philosophy,  and  Uni- 
VERSALs);  criterion  of  the  validity  of  an  inference, 
—  vide  Criterion;  it  is  ordinarily  the  antecedent 
of  assent,  157;  acts  of  inference  are  both  the  ante- 
cedents of  assent  before  assenting,  and  its  usual 
concomitants  after  assenting,  189;  the  pleasure 
belonging  to  inference,  207-8;  inference  and  assent 
are  the  immediate  instruments  of  the  acquisition 
of  knowledge,  349. 

Inference  and  Notional  Assent:  it  may  be  difficult, 
by  external  tokens,  to  distinguish  given  acts  of 
assent  from  given  acts  of  inference,  38;  resemblance 
exists  only  in  cases  of  notional  assents;  because  the 
apprehension  which  accompanies  acts  of  inference 
is  notional  also  (for  an  act  of  inference  includes  in 
its  object  the  dependence  of  its  thesis  upon  its 
premisses,  that  is,  upon  a  relation,  which  is  an 
abstraction,  40),  and  because  inference  is  engaged 
for  the  most  part  on  notional  propositions,  both 
premiss  and  conclusion,  39,  75;  in  its  notional  assents 
as  well  as  in  its  inferences,  the  mind  contemplates 
its  own  creations  instead  of  things,  75. 


100  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Infinitude:  we  believe  in  the  infinitude  of  the  Divine 
Attributes,  but  we  can  have  no  experience  of  in- 
finitude as  a  fact;  the  word  stands  for  a  definition 
or  a  notion,  52. 

Informal  Inference:  the  real  and  necessary  method 
by  which  w^e  are  enabled  to  become  certain  of  what 
is  concrete  is  the  cumulation  of  probabilities,  inde- 
pendent of  each  other,  arising  out  of  the  nature  and 
circumstances  of  the  particular  case  which  is  under 
review;  probabilities  too  fine  to  avail  separately, 
too  subtle  and  circuitous  to  be  convertible  into 
syllogisms,  too  numerous  and  various  for  such  con- 
version, even  were  they  convertible,  288;  example 
of  a  syllogism  which  we  may  suppose  to  be  presented 
to  an  educated,  thoughtful  Protestant:  "All  Protes- 
tants are  bound  to  join  the  Church;  you  are  a  Protes- 
tant: ergo";  he  is  a  concrete  individual  unit,  and 
being  so  is  under  so  many  laws,  and  is  the  subject 
of  so  many  predications  all  at  once,  that  he  cannot 
determine,  offhand,  his  position  and  his  duty  by 
the  law  and  the  predication  of  one  syllogism  in  par- 
ticular, 288-9;  none  of  the  questions  he  puts  to  him- 
self as  regards  it  admit  of  simple  demonstration; 
but  each  carries  with  it  a  number  of  independent 
probable  arguments,  sufficient,  when  united,  for  a 
reasonable  conclusion  about  itself;  and  to  this  con- 
clusion he  comes  not  by  any  possible  verbal  enumera- 
tion of  all  the  considerations  which  unite  to  bring 
him  to  it;  but  by  a  mental  comprehension  of  the 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  101 

Informal  Inference:  continued. 
whole  case,  and  a  discernment  of  its  upshot,  291; 
this  method  of  reasoning  in  concrete  matters  has 
these  characteristics:  (1)  it  does  not  supersede  the 
logical  form  of  inference,  but  is  one  and  the  same 
with  it,  only  it  is  no  longer  an  abstraction,  but  car- 
ried out  into  the  realities  of  life;  (2)  it  is  more  or 
less  implicit,  and  without  the  direct  and  full  advert- 
ence of  the  mind  exercising  it;  the  mind  is  unequal 
to  a  complete  analysis  of  the  motives  which  carry 
it  on  to  a  particular  conclusion;  (3)  it  is  conditional; 
for  it  is  still  as  dependent  on  premisses  as  it  is  in  its 
elementary  idea,  292-3  (vide  Probabilities);  its 
action  illustrated  in  the  case  of  our  certitude,  (1)  of 
the  insularity  of  Great  Britain,  (2)  of  the  genuine- 
ness of  the  Classics,  (3)  of  our  future  death,  (4)  of 
our  birth,  294-301 ;  an  object  of  sense  presents  itself 
to  our  view  as  one  whole,  and  not  in  its  separate 
details;  such  too  is  the  intellectual  view  we  take  of 
the  momenta  of  proof  for  a  concrete  truth;  we  grasp 
the  full  tale  of  premisses  and  conclusion,  per  modum 
unius,  —  by  a  sort  of  instinctive  perception  of  the 
legitimate  conclusion  in  and  through  the  premisses, 
not  by  a  formal  juxta-position  of  propositions, 
301-2,  316;  an  intellectual  question  may  strike  two 
minds  very  differently,  and  lead  them  to  opposite 
conclusions;  and  a  body  of  proof,  or  a  line  of  argu- 
ment, may  produce  a  distinct,  nay,  a  dissimilar 
effect,  as  addressed  to  one  or  to  the  other,  302;  in 


102  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Informal  Inference:  continued. 
concrete  reasonings  we  judge  for  ourselves,  by  our 
own  lights,  and  on  our  own  principles,  302  (vide 
Criterion);  this  illustrated,  (1)  in  the  case  of  the 
proposition,  "We  shall  have  a  European  war,  for 
Greece  is  audaciously  defying  Turkey,"  303-4,  — 
(2)  in  the  case  of  passages  from  Leighton  and  Cole- 
ridge on  certain  of  our  conceptions  about  God,  304-6, 

—  (3)  in  the  case  of  Hume's  argument  against 
miracles,  306-7,  —  (4)  in  the  case  of  a  passage  from 
Pascal  on  the  establishment  of  Christianity,  307-10, 

—  (5)  in  the  case  of  passages  from  Pascal  on  the 
self-satisfied  sceptic  and  the  scepticism  of  Montaigne, 
310-12,  —  (6)  in  the  case  of  the  dying  factory  girl, 
312-13,  —  (7)  in  the  case  of  a  passage  from  Dr. 
Samuel  Clarke  on  the  argument  for  the  Divine 
Attribute  of  Knowledge,  313-16;  a  proof,  except 
in  abstract  demonstration,  has  always  in  it,  more 
or  less,  an  element  of  the  personal,  317;  vide  Proof, 
"Judicium  Prudentis  Viri,"  Certitude,  and 
Moral  Being;  the  principle  of  concrete  reasoning 
is  parallel  to  the  method  of  proof  which  is  the  founda- 
tion of  modern  mathematical  science,  as  contained 
in  the  celebrated  lemma  with  which  Newton  opens 
his  "Principia,"  320;  the  conclusion  in  a  real  or 
concrete  question  is  foreseen  and  predicted  rather 
than  actually  attained,  on  account  of  the  nature  of 
its  subject-matter,  and  the  delicate  and  implicit 
character  of  at  least  part  of  the  reasonings  on  which 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  103 

Informal  Inference:  continued. 

it  depends,  321;  the  logical  form  of  this  argument  is 
indirect,  viz.,  that  "the  conclusion  cannot  be  other- 
wise," 321;  this  illustrated,  (1)  by  a  passage  from 
Wood's  Mechanics  on  the  proof  of  the  laws  of  motion, 
322-3,  —  (2)  by  two  passages  on  circumstantial 
evidence,  324-8,  —  (3)  by  a  passage  on  the  divina- 
tion of  the  authorship  of  a  certain  anonymous 
publication,  328-9. 

Ingleby,  Dr.,  495. 

Inquiry:  inquiry  is  inconsistent  with  assent;  for  he 
who  inquires  is  in  doubt  where  the  truth  lies,  and 
wishes  his  present  profession  either  proved  or  dis- 
proved, 191;  vide  Investigation;  a  Catholic  is  not 
allowed  to  inquire  into  the  truth  of  his  Creed;  for 
the  Catholic  who  sets  about  inquiring  thereby 
declares  that  he  is  not  a  Catholic,  191;  the  pleasure 
attendant  on  inquiry,  —  vide  Search;  no  inquiry 
comes  to  good  which  is  not  conducted  under  a  deep 
sense  of  responsibility,  and  of  the  issues  depending 
upon  its  determination,  426  (vide  Conscientious- 
ness, and  Truth). 

Instinct:  instinct  is  a  force  which  spontaneously 
impels  us,  not  only  to  bodily  movements,  but  to 
mental  acts,  62;  it  is  a  perception  of  facts  without 
assignable  media  of  perceiving,  334;  vide  Phenom- 
ena, and  Substance;  it  leads  the  quasi-intelligent 
principle  in  brutes  to  perceive  in  the  phenomena  of 
sense  a  something  distinct  from  and  beyond  those 


10-1  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Instinct:  continued. 

phenomena,  62,  110-11;  this  is  no  mere  physical 
instinct,  such  as  that  which  leads  the  new-dropped 
lamb  to  his  mother  for  milk,  111;  it  is  instinct  which 
impels  the  child  to  recognize  in  the  smiles  or  the 
frowns  of  a  countenance  which  meets  his  eyes,  not 
only  a  being  external  to  himself,  but  one  whose 
looks  elicit  in  him  confidence  or  fear,  62 ;  and  it  leads 
him  to  perceive  in  the  dictates  of  conscience  an 
external  being,  who  reads  his  mind,  to  whom  he  is 
responsible,  who  praises  and  blames,  who  promises 
and  threatens,  62,  104,  105,  110,  112  (vide  Con- 
science). 

Intellect,  —  vide  Mind. 

Intellectual  School  will  always  have  something  of 
an  esoteric  chracter;  for  it  is  an  assemblage  of 
minds  that  think;  their  bond  is  unity  of  thought, 
and  their  words  become  a  sort  of  tessera,  not  ex- 
pressing thought,  but  symbolizing  it,  309. 

Interpretative:  the  conclusion  in  an  induction  is  proved 
interpretative,   323   (vide  Informal  Inference). 

Interpretative  Certitude,  —  vide  Material  Cer- 
titude. 

Interrogative  Proposition,  —  vide  Proposition. 

Introspection  of  our  intellectual  operations  is  not 
the  best  of  means  for  preserving  us  from  intellectual 
hesitations;  to  meddle  with  the  springs  of  thought 
and  action  is  really  to  weaken  them,  216-17  (vide 
Argumentation). 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  105 

Inventive  Faculty:  we  are  able  by  an  inventive 
faculty  to  follow  the  description  of  things  which 
have  never  come  before  us,  and  to  form,  out  of  such 
passive  impressions  as  experience  has  heretofore 
left  on  our  minds,  new  images,  which,  though  mental 
creations,  are  in  no  sense  abstractions,  and  though 
ideal,  are  not  notional,  27;  it  is  the  very  praise  we 
give  to  the  characters  of  some  great  poet  or  historian 
that  he  is  so  individual,  27;  this  faculty  enables  us 
to  live  in  the  past  and  in  the  distant,  28;  it  is  of 
course  a  step  beyond  experience;  it  is  mainly  limited 
as  regards  its  materials,  by  the  sense  of  sight,  28. 

Inventors,  —  vide  Action  of  Life. 

Inveracity,  —  vide  Sin. 

Investigation:  investigation  is  not  inconsistent  with 
assent,  191-4  (vide  Inquiry);  there  are  minds  with 
whom  at  all  times  to  question  a  truth  is  to  make  it 
questionable,  and  to  investigate  is  equivalent  to 
inquiring,  192;  in  the  case  of  educated  minds,  in- 
vestigations into  the  argumentative  proof  of  the 
things  to  which  they  have  given  their  assent  is  an 
obligation,  or  rather  a  necessity,  192,  194;  processes 
of  investigation  often  issue  in  the  reversal  of  the 
assents  which  they  were  originall}"  intended  to 
confirm,  192-3  (vide  Belief);  my  vague  conscious- 
ness of  the  possibility  of  a  reversal  of  my  belief  in 
the  course  of  my  researches  does  not  interfere  with 
the  honesty  and  firmness  of  that  belief  while  those 
researches  proceed,  193. 


106  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Ionian  Festival,  78. 

Ireland,  199. 

Irishman,  33. 

Isaac,  442. 

Isaiah,  446. 

Islam,  249. 

islamism,  149,  241. 

Israel:  435,  436;  vide  Jews;  King  of  Israel,  453. 

"It  has  been  said  by  them  of  old  time,"  etc.,  448. 

"  It  has  pleased  God  by  the  foolishness  of  preaching," 

etc.,  466. 
"  It  hath  not  yet  appeared  what  we  shall  be,"  etc.,  466. 
Italians,  33. 


Jacob,  442,  450. 

James,  St.:  200;  quoted,  453. 

James  the  First,  27,  28-9. 

Jerome,  St.:  103;  quoted,  469. 

Jerusalem:  437,  451;  siege  of  Jerusalem  by  Titus,  435. 

Jesus,  39,  474,  475,  476,  479,  482,  483,  484. 

"Jesus  Christ,  whom  you  have  not  seen,  yet  love," 
etc.,  466. 

Jewish  Law,  252. 

Jews:  10,  250,  252,  308;  their  poetry  pours  itself  out 
in  devotional  compositions  which  Christianity, 
through  all  its  many  countries  and  ages,  has  been 
unable  to  rival,  433;  the  conversion  of  Jews  to  Chris- 
tianity is  not  an  instance  of  loss  of  certitude,  if  the 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  107 

Jews:  continued. 

zeal  for  the  sufficiency  of  their  law  was  not  found  in 
those  who  were  eventually  converted,  253;  those 
Jews  became  Christians  in  Apostolic  times  who  were 
already  what  may  be  called  crypto-Christians,  413- 
14;  the  Jews  are  one  of  the  few  Oriental  nations  who 
are  known  in  history  as  a  people  of  progress,  and 
their  line  of  progress  is  the  development  of  religious 
truth;  their  country  may  be  called  the  classical 
home  of  the  religious  principle;  Theism  is  emphati- 
cally their  natural  religion,  for  they  never  were 
without  it,  and  were  made  a  people  by  means  of  it, 
432;  this  is  a  phenomenon  singular  and  solitary  in 
history,  and  if  there  be  a  God  and  Providence,  it 
must  come  from  Him,  and  the  people  themselves 
have  ever  maintained  that  it  has  been  His  direct 
work,  and  has  been  recognized  by  Him  as  such,  432; 
they  were  just  the  one  people  who  professed,  as 
their  distinguishing  doctrine,  the  Divine  Unity  and 
Government  of  the  world,  and  that,  not  only  as  a 
natural  truth,  but  as  revealed  to  them  by  that  God 
Himself  of  whom  they  spoke,  432-3;  they  begin 
with  the  beginning  of  history,  and  the  preaching  of 
this  dogma  begins  with  them;  they  are  its  witnesses 
and  confessors,  even  to  torture  and  death;  on  it 
prophet  after  prophet  bases  his  further  revelations, 
with  a  sustained  reference  to  a  time  when  it  is  to 
receive  completion  and  perfection,  433;  when  that 
time  of  destined  blessing  came,  instead  of  any  final 


108  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Jews:  continued. 

favour  coming  on  them  from  above,  they  fell  under 
the  power  of  their  enemies,  and  were  overthrown, 
and  the  remnant  of  their  people  cast  off  to  wander 
through  every  land  except  their  own,  433-4;  a 
peculiar  reproach  and  note  of  infamy  is  affixed  to 
their  name,  434;  it  was  their  belief  that  God's  pro- 
tection was  unchangeable,  and  that  their  law  would 
last  forever;  they  were  taught  that  it  could  not  die, 
except  by  changing  into  a  new  self,  more  wonderful 
than  it  was  before;  they  expected  that  a  promised 
King  was  coming,  the  Messiah,  who  would  extend 
the  sway  of  Israel  over  all  people,  434-5;  the  failure 
of  their  expectation  is  not  a  proof  that  there  was 
nothing  providential  in  their  history;  for  a  second 
portent  does  not  obliterate  a  first;  and  further,  the 
Book  of  Deuteronomy  indicates  that  the  disappoint- 
ment was  not  necessarily  out  of  keeping  with  the 
original  divine  purpose,  or  again  with  the  old  promise 
made  to  them,  and  their  confident  expectation  of 
its  fulfilment;  their  national  ruin,  which  came  in- 
stead of  aggrandizement,  is  described  in  that  book, 
in  spite  of  all  promises,  with  an  emphasis  and  minute- 
ness which  prove  that  it  was  contemplated  long 
before,  435-6;  vide  Christianity;  it  is  not  wonder- 
ful that  the  Jews  could  not  recognize  their  Messiah 
as  the  promised  King  as  we  recognize  Him  now;  for 
we  have  the  experience  of  His  history  for  nearly 
two  thousand   years,   by  which  to  interpret  their 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  109 

Jews:  continued. 

Scriptures;  we  may  partly  understand  their  position 
towards  those  prophecies,  by  our  own  at  present 
towards  the  Apocalypse,  446  (vide  Apocalypse); 
the  Jews  held  from  the  first  that  each  nation  had  its 
own  gods,  holding  also  that  all  gods  but  their  own 
God  were  idols  and  demons,  450;  473,  477;  vide 
Gibbon. 

Joanna  Southcote,  198. 

Job,  the  Patriarch,  80. 

John,  St.:  137,  139,  152,  200,  244,  250,  468,  472,  480; 
the  first  half  of  the  first  chapter  of  St.  John's  gospel 
illustrates  the  real  assent  which  can  be  given  to  the 
proposition  "The  Son  is  God,"  and  its  power  over 
our  affections  and  emotions,  138-9;  quoted,  466. 

John,  St.,  the  Baptist,  449. 

Johnson,  Dr.,  47,  103,  298,  338. 

JosEPHUs:  quoted,  444. 

Joshua:  442  note;  457;  Book  of,  442. 

JuDAH,  442,  445. 

JuDAiSAi,  —  vide  Jews;  241,  251,  252,  432,  437,  438, 
439,  440,  449. 

Judas  of  Galilee,  450. 

JuDEA,  443,  444,  469,  475. 

Judge:  advice  of  a  certain  judge  to  a  friend,  to  lay 
down  the  law  boldly,  but  never  give  his  reasons,  303. 

Judge,  Supreme:  104,  116;  vide  Conscience. 

Judges,  Book  of,  442  note. 

Judgment:   judgment   in  all   concrete  matter  is  the 


no  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Judgment:  continued. 

architectonic  faculty;  and  what  may  be  called  the 
Illative  Sense,  or  right  judgment  in  ratiocination, 
is  one  branch  of  it,  342;  judgment  in  conduct,  — 
vide  Taste,  Conduct,  and  Phronesis;  Final  Judg- 
ment, vide  Atonement,  and  Natural  Religion; 
rash  judgment,  —  vide  Rash  Judgment. 

"Judicium  Prudentis  Viri"  is  a  standard  of  certi- 
tude which  holds  good  in  all  concrete  matter,  not  only 
in  cases  of  practice  and  duty,  but  in  questions  of 
truth  and  falsehood  generally,  317  (vide  Informal 
Inference). 

Julian:  quoted,  468. 

Jupiter:  the  planet,  71;  Jupiter  and  Neptune,  as 
represented  in  the  classical  mythology,  are  evil 
spirits,  419. 

Just  and  Unjust,  —  vide  Principles,  First. 

Justin  Martyr,  St.:  481;  quoted,  474. 

"  Justum  et  tenacem,"  etc.,  37,  38,  39. 

K 

Kent,  Duke  of,  225. 

Key  to  prophecy,  — 7  vide  Prophecy. 

King:  the  child's  idea  of  a  king,  as  derived  from  his 
picture-book,  will  be  that  of  a  fierce  or  stern  or 
venerable  man,  seated  above  a  flight  of  steps,  with 
a  crown  on  his  head  and  a  sceptre  in  his  hand,  26. 

Know:  to  assent  to  a  proposition  objectively  true  as 
well  as  subjectively  is  to  know,  195-6. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  111 

Knowledge:  do  not  attempt  by  philosophy  what  once 
was  done  by  religion;  the  ascendency  of  faith  may 
be  impracticable,  but  the  reign  of  knowledge  is  in- 
comprehensible, 92  (vide  Conclusion,  and  De- 
duction); certitude  about  a  thing  is  the  knowledge 
of  its  truth,  197;  what  is  once  true  is  always  true, 
and  cannot  fail,  whereas  v/hat  is  once  known  need 
not  always  be  known,  and  is  capable  of  failing,  197; 
the  repose  in  self  and  in  its  object,  as  connected  with 
self,  which  belongs  to  certitude,  does  not  attach  to 
mere  knowing,  that  is,  to  the  perception  of  things, 
but  to  the  consciousness  of  having  that  knowledge; 
the  pleasure  of  perceiving  truth  without  reflecting 
on  it  as  truth  is  not  very  different,  except  in  in- 
tensity and  in  dignity,  from  the  pleasure,  as  such, 
of  assent  or  belief  given  to  what  is  not  true,  205 
(vide  Image);  the  pursuit  of  knowledge  has  its  own 
pleasure,  —  as  distinct  from  the  pleasures  of  knowl- 
edge, as  it  is  distinct  from  that  of  consciously 
possessing  it,  206-7  (vide  Search)  ;  as  there  is  a  con- 
dition of  mind  which  is  characterized  by  invincible 
ignorance,  so  there  is  another  which  may  be  said  to 
be  possessed  of  invincible  knowledge,  211;  inference 
and  assent  are  the  immediate  instruments  of  the 
acquisition  of  knowledge,  349;  knowledge  is  power, 
for  it  enables  us  to  use  eternal  principles  which  we 
cannot  alter,  350-1. 


112  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

L 

Lacordaire,  Fr.,  489  note. 

Language:  an  Economist  uses  language  as  the  vehicle 
of  things,  and  a  schoolboy  translating, of  abstractions, 
21-2;  the  use  of  language,  as  conveying  notions,  is 
not  only  the  very  foundation  of  all  science,  but  may 
be,  and  is,  carried  out  in  literature  and  in  the  ordi- 
nary intercourse  of  man  with  man;  and  thus  it  comes 
to  pass  that  individual  propositions  about  the  con- 
crete almost  cease  to  be,  and  are  diluted  or  starved 
into  abstract  notions,  31;  notional  apprehension  is, 
and  ever  must  be,  the  popular  and  ordinary  mode 
of  apprehending  language,  33;  propositions  may 
and  must  be  used  as  the  expression  of  facts,  and 
they  are  necessary  to  the  mind  in  the  same  way  that 
language  is  ever  necessary  for  denoting  facts,  both 
for  ourselves  as  individuals,  and  for  our  intercourse 
with  others,  120;  it  will  be  our  wisdom  to  avail  our- 
selves of  language,  as  far  as  it  will  go,  but  to  aim 
mainly  by  means  of  it  to  stimulate,  in  those  to  whom 
we  address  ourselves,  a  mode  of  thinking  and  trains 
of  thought  similar  to  our  own,  leading  them  on  by 
their  own  independent  action,  not  by  any  syllogistic 
compulsion,  309  (vide  Syllogism);  vide  Words, 
Progress,  and  Mind. 

Lateran  Council,  Fourth,  134. 

"Latet  dolus  in  generalibus,"  279. 

Laud,  361. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  113 

Laurence,  St.,  words  of,  483. 

Law:  natural  law  is  the  fact  that  things  happen  uni- 
formly according  to  certain  circumstances,  and  not 
without  them  and  at  random:  that  is,  that  they 
happen  in  an  order,  68-9;  state  or  public  law  is 
inflexible,  355;  a  law  is  not  a  cause,  but  a  fact,  72; 
there  is  no  known  law  of  the  coincidence  of  laws,  85, 
84,  427,  457  (vide  Wonderful);  general  laws  are 
not  inviolable  truths;  much  less  zre  they  necessary 
causes,  280,  202,  255;  a  law  is  not  a  fact,  but  a  no- 
tion, 280;  a  law  is  a  generalized  fact,  299;  no  law  is 
carried  out,  except  in  cases  where  it  acts  freely,  299. 

Laws  of  Nature  :  the  uniformity  of  the  laws  of  nature 
is  a  first  principle,  derived  by  us  from  experience, 
and  accepted  with  what  is  called  a  presumption,  68 
(vide  Presumption,  and  Causation);  by  scientific 
analysis,  we  are  led  to  the  conclusion  that  phe- 
nomena, which  seem  very  different  from  each  other, 
admit  of  being  grouped  together  as  modes  of  the 
operation  of  one  hypothetical  law,  acting  under 
varied  circumstances,  69;  this  generalization  loses 
its  character  of  hypothesis,  and  becomes  a  prob- 
ability, in  proportion  as  we  have  reason  for  thinking 
on  other  grounds  that  the  particles  of  all  matter 
really  move  and  act  towards  each  other  in  one  cer- 
tain way  in  relation  to  space  and  time,  and  not  in 
half  a  dozen  ways,  69;  the  order  of  nature  is  not 
necessary,  but  general  in  its  manifestations,  71;  our 
experience  is  adverse  to  the  doctrine  that  the  laws 


114  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Laws  of  Nature:  continued. 

of  nature  are  inviolable;  for  no  concrete  fact  or 
phenomenon  exactly  repeats  itself;  the  earth,  for 
instance,  never  moves  exactly  in  the  same  orbit 
year  by  year,  but  is  in  perpetual  vacillation;  science 
accounts  for  this,  not  by  appeal  to  experience,  but 
by  more  or  less  probable  hypotheses,  argued  out  by 
means  of  an  assumed  analogy  between  cosmical 
bodies  and  falling  bodies  on  the  earth;  "assumed," 
because  that  analogy  (in  other  words,  the  unfailing 
uniformity  of  nature)  is  the  very  point  which  has 
to  be  proved,  70-1 ;  it  has  not  yet  been  proved  even 
that  the  law  of  velocity  of  falling  bodies  on  the  earth 
is  invariable  in  its  operation,  71;  if  we  expect  a 
thing  to  happen  twice,  it  is  because  we  think  it  is 
not  an  accident,  but  has  a  cause,  71-2;  a  law  is  not 
a  cause,  but  a  fact;  we  have  no  experience  of  any 
cause  but  Will ;  That  which  willed  the  order  of  nature, 
can  unwill  it;  and  the  in  variableness  of  law  depends 
on  the  unchangeableness  of  that  Will,  72  (vide 
Miracles);  as  a  cause  implies  a  will,  so  order  im- 
plies a  purpose,  72  (vide  Order);  the  agency  then 
which  has  kept  up  and  keeps  up  the  general  laws  of 
nature  must  be  Mind,  and  nothing  else,  and  Mind 
at  least  as  wide  and  as  enduring  in  its  living  action 
as  the  immeasurable  ages  and  spaces  of  the  universe 
on  which  that  agency  has  left  its  traces,  72. 

Lawgiver,  Sovereign,   114  (vide  Conscience). 

Lawyer:  philosophers,   experimentalists,   lawyers,   in 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  115 

Lawyer:  continued. 
their  several  ways,  have  commonly  the  reputation 
of  being,  at  least  on  moral  and  religious  subjects, 
hard  of  belief,  because,  proceeding  in  the  necessary 
investigation  by  the  analytical  method  of  verbal 
inference,  they  find  within  its  limits  no  sufficient 
resources  for  attaining  a  conclusion,  285 ;  our  lawyers 
prefer  the  examination  of  present  witnesses  to  affi- 
davits on  paper,  298;  332;  we  often  hear  of  the 
exploits  of  some  great  lawyer,  judge  or  advocate, 
who  is  able  in  perplexed  cases,  when  common  minds 
see  nothing  but  a  hopeless  heap  of  facts,  foreign  or 
contrary  to  each  other,  to  detect  the  principle  which 
rightly  interprets  the  riddle,  and,  to  the  admiration 
of  all  hearers,  converts  a  chaos  into  an  orderly  and 
luminous  whole,  372. 

Lazarus,  312. 

Legitimist,  85. 

Leighton:  56;  quoted,  304-5. 

Leonidas,  father  of  Origen,  482-3. 

Lesbos:  in  old  times  the  mason's  rule  which  was  in 
use  at  Lesbos  was  not  of  wood  or  iron,  but  of  lead, 
so  as  to  allow  of  its  adjustment  to  the  uneven  sur- 
face of  the  stones  brought  together  for  the  work, 
355. 

Lewis,  Sir  George,  364,  365,  366,  367,  369,  370. 

"Lex  orandi,  lex  credendi,"  134. 

LiBANius:  quoted,  468. 

Liberty  of  Prophesying,  Bishop  Taylor's:  quoted,  143. 


116  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Life:  the  action  of  life,  —  vide  Action  of  Life; 
science  of  life,  —  vide  Conduct. 

"  Lift  up  your  eyes,  and  see  the  countries,"  etc.,  451. 

"Light  is  come  into  the  world,"  etc.,  451. 

Lilly,  Mr.:  495,  499;  letter  of,  500-1. 

Literary  Man:  the  primary  duty  of  a  literary  man  is 
to  have  clear  conceptions,  and  to  be  exact  and 
intelligible  in  expressing  them,  20-1. 

Literature:  the  tradition  of  " testimonia,"  such  as 
are  prefixed  to  the  classics  and  the  Fathers,  together 
with  the  absence  of  dissentient  voices,  is  the  ade- 
quate groundwork  of  our  belief  in  the  history  of 
literature,  298  (vide  Classics). 

LivY,  22,  296,  297. 

Locke:  this  celebrated  writer  speaks  freely  of  degrees 
of  assent,  and  considers  that  the  strength  of  assent 
given  to  each  proposition  varies  with  the  strength 
of  the  inference  on  which  the  assent  follows;  yet  he 
is  obliged  to  make  exceptions  to  his  general  prin- 
ciple; and  he  allows  that  inferences,  which  are  only 
"near  upon  certainty,"  are  so  near,  that  we  legiti- 
mately accept  them  with  "no  doubt  at  all,"  and 
"assent  to  them  as  firmly  as  if  they  were  infallibly 
demonstrated,"  160-1;  quoted,  161,  162-3;  incon- 
sistency of  his  view,  163-4;  he  takes  a  view  of  the 
human  mind,  in  relation  to  inference  and  assent, 
which  is  theoretical  and  unreal;  he  consults  his  own 
ideal  of  how  the  mind  ought  to  act,  instead  of  in- 
terrogating human  nature,  as  an  existing  thing,  as 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  117 

Locke:  continued. 

it  is  found  in  the  world,  164;  Locke's  theory  of  the 
duty  of  assenting  more  or  less  according  to  degrees 
of  evidence  is  invalidated  by  the  testimony  of  high 
and  low,  young  and  old,  ancient  and  modern,  as 
continually  given  in  their  sayings  and  doings,  176, 
316-17;  494. 

Logic:  logic  makes  but  a  sorry  rhetoric  with  the  mul- 
titude; first  shoot  round  corners,  and  you  may  not 
despair  of  converting  by  a  syllogism,  94  (vide  Con- 
clusion, and  Syllogism);  logic  is  not  the  measure 
of  assent,  180  (vide  Argument,  and  Assent);  262; 
logic  is  the  science  which  is  the  regulating  principle 
of  inference,  263,  264  (vide  Reasoning,  and  Formal 
Inference);  its  chain  of  conclusions  hangs  loose  at 
both  ends,  284  (vide  Universals);  the  uses  of 
logical  inference,  285-7;  our  inquiries  spontaneously 
fall  into  scientific  sequence,  and  we  think  in  logic, 
as  we  talk  in  prose,  without  aiming  at  doing  so,  286; 
the  prejudice  which  exists  against  logic  in  the  popu- 
lar mind,  and  the  animadversions  which  are  levelled 
against  it,  are  due  to  the  fact  that  the  processes  of 
reasoning  which  legitimately  lead  to  assent,  to 
action,  to  certitude,  are  in  fact  too  multiform,  subtle, 
omnigenous,  too  implicit,  to  allow  of  being  measured 
by  rule,  that  they  are  after  all  personal,  —  verbal 
argumentation  being  useful  only  in  subordination 
to  a  higher  logic,  302-3;  reason  never  bids  us  be 
certain  except   on  an  absolute   proof;  and  such  a 


118  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Logic:  continued. 

proof  can  never  be  furnished  to  us  by  the  logic  of 
words,  for  as  certitude  is  of  the  mind,  so  is  the  act 
of  inference  which  leads  to  it,  345  (vide  Proof);  it 
is  natural  to  ask  the  question,  why  logic  is  made  an 
instrumental  art  sufficient  for  determining  every 
sort  of  truth,  while  no  one  would  dream  of  making 
any  one  formula,  however  generalized,  a  working 
rule  at  once  for  poetry,  the  art  of  medicine,  and 
political  warfare,  358;  men  become  personal  when 
logic  fails;  it  is  their  mode  of  appealing  to  their  own 
primary  elements  of  thought,  and  their  own  illative 
sense,  against  the  principles  and  the  judgment  of 
another,  369. 

London,  26,  64,  129. 

"Looked  for  the  redemption  of  Israel,"  253. 

Louis  the  Eleventh,  29. 

LucERN,  15,  16,  17. 

Lucius,  481. 

Lucretius,  391,  392,  400,  401. 

Luther,  245. 

Lyceum,  469. 

"  Lydia,  whose  heart  the  Lord  opened,"  etc.,  415. 

Lyons,  481. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  119 

M 

Maccab.^us,  458. 

Madeika,  86. 

Mahomet,  252,  404,  430,  440,  452. 

Mahometan,  250,  252. 

Mahometanism:  251;  it  is  the  mere  creed  and  rite  of 
certain  races,  bringing  with  it,  as  such,  no  gifts  to 
our  nature;  while  Christianity  was  the  heir  to  a  dead 
religion,  Mahometanism  was  little  more  than  a 
rebellion  against  a  living  one;  moreover,  though 
Mahomet  professed  to  be  the  Paraclete,  no  one 
pretends  that  he  occupies  a  place  in  the  Christian 
Scriptures  as  prominent  as  that  which  the  Messiah 
fills  in  the  Jewish,  440. 

Man:  vide  Self,  and  Being;  man  is  not  a  reasoning 
animal;  he  is  a  seeing,  feeling,  contemplating,  acting 
animal,  94;  man  is  the  highest  of  the  animals,  and 
more  indeed  than  an  animal,  as  having  a  mind;  that 
is,  he  has  a  complex  nature  different  from  theirs, 
with  a  higher  aim  and  a  specific  perfection;  but  still 
the  fact  that  other  beings  find  their  good  in  the  use 
of  their  particular  nature  is  a  reason  for  anticipating 
that  to  use  duly  our  own  is  our  interest  as  well  as 
our  necessity,  348;  though  man  cannot  change  what 
he  is  born  with,  he  is  a  being  of  progress  with  rela- 
tion to  his  perfection  and  characteristic  good,  349, 
233;  he  has  to  learn  how  to  fulfil  his  end,  and  to  be 
what  facts  show  that  he  is  intended  to  be;  his  mind 


120  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Man:  continued. 

is  in  the  first  instance  in  disorder,  and  runs  wild; 
his  faculties  have  their  rudimental  and  inchoate 
state,  and  are  gradually  carried  on  by  practice  and 
experience  to  their  perfection,  233;  this  progress  is 
not  mechanical,  nor  is  it  of  necessity;  it  is  committed 
to  the  personal  efforts  of  each  individual  of  the 
species;  it  is  his  gift  to  be  the  creator  of  his  own 
sufficiency;  and  to  be  emphatically  self-made;  this 
law  of  progress  is  carried  out  by  means  of  the  ac- 
quisition of  knowledge,  of  which  inference  and 
assent  are  the  immediate  instruments;  supposing, 
then,  the  advancement  of  our  nature,  both  in  our- 
selves individually  and  as  regards  the  human  family, 
is,  to  every  one  of  us  in  his  place,  a  sacred  duty,  it 
follows  that  that  duty  is  intimately  bound  up  with 
the  right  use  of  these  two  main  instruments  of  ful- 
filling it;  and  as  we  do  not  gain  the  knowledge  of  the 
law  of  progress  by  any  a  priori  view  of  man,  but  by 
looking  at  it  as  the  interpretation  which  is  provided 
by  himself  on  a  large  scale  in  the  ordinary  action  of 
his  intellectual  nature,  so  too  we  must  appeal  to 
himself,  as  a  fact,  and  not  to  any  antecedent  theory, 
in  order  to  find  what  is  the  law  of  his  mind  as  re- 
gards the  two  faculties  in  question;  such  an  appeal 
shows  that  the  course  of  inference  is  ever  more  or 
less  obscure,  while  assent  is  ever  distinct  and  definite, 
and  yet  that  what  is  in  its  nature  thus  absolute  does 
in  fact  follow  upon  what  in  outward  manifestation 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  121 

Man:  continued. 

is  thus  complex,  indirect,  and  recondite,  349-50 
(vide  Act,  and  Function);  man's  progress  is  a 
living  growth,  not  a  mechanism;  and  its  instruments 
are  mental  acts,  not  the  formulas  and  contrivances 
of  language,  350;  we  should  not  distort  the  faculties 
of  the  human  mind  according  to  the  demands  of  an 
ideal  optimism,  351  (vide  Mind);  the  laws  of  the 
mind  are  the  expression,  not  of  mere  constituted 
order,  but  of  the  will  of  God;  I  should  be  bound  by 
them  even  were  they  not  His  laws;  but  since  one  of 
their  very  functions  is  to  tell  me  of  Him,  and  since 
w-e  are  able  to  feel  that  He  gave  them  to  us,  and  He 
can  overrule  them  for  us,  w^e  may  securely  take 
them  as  they  are,  and  use  them  as  we  find  them;  it 
is  He  who  teaches  all  knowledge;  and  the  way  by 
which  we  acquire  it  is  His  way;  if  w^e  take  the  way 
proper  to  our  subject-matter,  we  have  His  blessing 
upon  us,  and  shall  find,  besides  abundant  matter 
for  mere  opinion,  the  materials  in  due  measure  of 
proof  and  assent,  351-2,  412;  and  especially,  by 
this  disposition  of  things,  shall  we  learn,  as  regards 
religious  and  ethical  inquiries,  how  little  we  can 
effect,  however  much  we  exert  ourselves,  without 
that  Blessing,  352  (vide  Religious,  and  Self); 
vide  Evil;  a  man  differs  from  a  brute,  not  in  ration- 
ality only,  but  in  all  that  he  is,  even  in  those  respects 
in  which  he  is  most  like  a  brute;  so  that  his  whole 
self,    his   bones,    limbs,    make,    life,    reason,    moral 


122  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Man:  continued. 

feeling,  immortality,  and  all  that  he  is  besides,  is 
his  real  differentia,  in  contrast  to  a  horse  or  a  dog; 
instead  of  saying  that  two  men  differ  only  in  num- 
ber, we  ought  rather  to  say  that  they  differ  from 
each  other  in  all  that  they  are,  in  identity,  in  in- 
communicability,  in  personality,  282. 

"Many  are  called,  few  are  chosen,"  455. 

Marcus,  Emperor:  quoted,  476. 

Marengo,  49. 

Margin:  it  is  only  under  the  penetrating  and  subtle 
action  of  the  mind  itself  that  the  margin  disappears, 
which  intervenes  between  verbal  argumentation 
and  conclusions  in  the  concrete,  360  (vide  Mind). 

Market-Woman  who  was  struck  dead,  428. 

Marriage  Feast,  parable  of,  455. 

Mass,  Holy:  246;  in  the  Holy  Mass  He  who  once  died 
for  us  upon  the  Cross  brings  back  and  perpetuates, 
by  His  literal  presence  in  it,  that  one  and  the  same 
sacrifice  w^hich  cannot  be  repeated,  488. 

Material  Certitude:  simple  assent  is  material,  or 
interpretative,  or  virtual  certitude,  211-12;  mode  of 
changing  material  certitude  into  certitude  proper, 
212;  among  the  multitudes  who  are  implicitly  cer- 
tain, there  may  be  those  who  would  change  their 
assents,  did  they  seek  to  place  them  upon  an  argu- 
mentative footing,  213. 

Mathematician:  a  mathematician  would  not,  even  in 
questions  of  pure  science,  assent  to  his  own  con- 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  123 

Mathematician:  continued. 

elusions,  on  new  and  difficult  ground,  and  in  the  case 
of  abstruse  calculations,  however  often  he  went 
over  his  work,  till  he  had  the  corroboration  of  other 
judgments  besides  his  own,  171. 

Matthew,  St.,  152. 

Maximilian,  St.,  477. 

Maze:  it  is  a  principle  which  applies  to  all  matters  on 
which  we  reason,  that  what  is  only  a  maze  of  facts, 
without  order  or  drift  prior  to  the  due  explanation, 
may,  when  once  we  have  that  explanation,  be  located 
and  adjusted  with  great  facility  in  all  its  separate 
parts,  as  we  know  is  the  case  as  regards  the  motions  of 
the  heavenly  bodies  since  the  hypothesis  of  Newton, 
445-6  (vide  Prophecy,  Mystery,  and  Enigmas). 

Medicine:  pathology  and  medicine,  in  the  interests 
of  science,  and  as  a  protection  to  the  practitioner, 
veil  the  shocking  realities  of  disease  and  physical 
suffering  under  a  notional  phraseology,  under  the 
abstract  terms  debility,  distress,  irritability,  parox- 
ysm, and  a  host  of  Greek  and  Latin  words;  the 
arts  of  medicine  and  surgery  are  necessarily  experi- 
mental; but  for  writing  and  conversing  on  these 
subjects  they  require  to  be  stripped  of  the  associa- 
tion of  the  facts  from  which  they  are  derived,  22. 

Meditation  on  Scripture,  —  vide  Scripture. 

"Memores  conditionis  nostra?,"  421. 

Memoria  Technica:  writing  is  a  memoria  technica, 
261,  337. 


124  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Memory:  memory  consists  in  a  present  imagination 
of  things  that  are  past;  memory  retains  the  impres- 
sions and  likenesses  of  what  they  were  when  before 
us,  23;  it  has  to  do  with  individual  things  and 
nothing  that  is  not  individual,  24;  the  memory  of 
sights  is  more  vivid  than  the  memory  of  sounds, 
scents,  or  tastes,  24;  the  image  supplied  by  the 
memory  need  not  be  in  any  sense  an  abstraction, 
25;  the  apprehension  which  we  have  of  our  past 
mental  acts  of  any  kind  is  an  apprehension  of  the 
memory  of  those  definite  acts,  and  therefore  an 
apprehension  of  things;  propositions  embodying  the 
notices  of  our  history  remain  imprinted  upon  our 
memory  as  sharply  and  deeply  as  is  any  recollection 
of  sight;  such  recollections  may  have  in  them  an 
individuality  and  completeness  which  outlives  the 
impressions  made  by  sensible  objects,  25;  by  means 
of  these  particular  and  personal  experiences  we 
attain  an  apprehension  of  what  such  things  are  at 
other  times  when  we  have  not  experience  of  them; 
and  when  we  meet  with  definite  propositions  ex- 
pressive of  them,  our  apprehension  cannot  be  called 
abstract  and  notional,  25-6  (vide  Experience); 
the  various  images  of  our  memory  form  the  materials 
of  the  inventive  faculty,  27-8  (vide  Inventive 
Faculty)  ;  it  is  difficult  to  draw  the  line  and  to  say 
where  the  office  of  the  memory  ends,  and  where 
abstraction  takes  its  place,  26;  our  trust  in  the 
faculty    of    memory,  —  vide    Faculty;    it    is    not 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  125 

Memory:  continued. 

always  accurate,  and  has  on  that  account  led  to  the 
adoption  of  writing,  as  being  a  memoria  technica, 
unaffected  by  the  failure  of  mental  impressions, 
261,  337;  there  is  an  analogy  between  ratiocination 
and  memory,  though  the  latter  may  be  exercised 
without  antecedents  or  media,  whereas  the  former 
requires  them  in  its  very  idea;  at  the  same  time 
association  has  so  much  to  do  with  memory,  that 
we  may  not  unfairly  consider  memory  as  depending 
on  certain  previous  conditions,  336-7;  we  weaken 
our  memory  in  proportion  as  we  habituate  ourselves 
to  commit  all  that  we  wish  to  remember  to  m.em- 
orandums,  337;  in  the  case  of  men  of  strong  memory 
in  any  particular  subject-matter,  all  artificial  ex- 
pedients are  as  difficult  and  repulsive  as  the  natural 
exercise  of  memory  is  healthy  and  easy  to  them, 
337;  memory,  as  a  talent,  is  not  one  indivisible 
faculty,  but  a  power  of  retaining  and  recalling  the 
past  in  this  or  that  department  of  our  experience, 
not  in  any  whatever,  340  (vide  Natural  Inference, 
Virtue,  and  Phronesis);  illustrations  of  this,  340-1. 

"Men  of  good  will,"  253. 

Mental  Constitution,  acceptance  of,  —  vide  Self, 
Being,  and  Man. 

Mental  Operations,  introspection  of,  —  vide  Intro- 
spection. 

Mere  Assertion:  a  mere  assertion  is  the  enunciation 
of  a   proposition   without   an   apprehension   of  the 


126  ^A^  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Mere  Assertion:  continued. 

matter  of  the  proposition,  13-14;  there  are  many- 
cases  in  which  it  is  impossible  to  discriminate  be- 
tween assent;  inference,  and  assertion,  on  account 
of  the  otiose,  passive,  inchoate  character  of  the  act 
in  question,  43;  belief  in  a  mystery  can  be  more 
than  an  assertion,  45. 

Merida,  484. 

Meritorious  Intercession:  the  doctrine  of  meri- 
torious intercession  is  proper  to  Natural  Religion, 
and  lightens  the  prophecies  of  evil  in  which  it  is 
founded;  hence  every  religion  has  had  its  eminent 
devotees,  exalted  above  the  body  of  the  people, 
mortified  men,  who  have  influence  with  the  Source 
of  good,  and  extend  a  shelter  and  gain  blessings  for 
those  who  become  their  clients;  a  belief  like  this  is 
one  of  the  most  natural  visions  of  the  young  and 
innocent,  407-8. 

Messiah,  434,  438,  440,  446,  447,  448,  449,  450,  452, 
457;  vide  Jews,  and  Christianity. 

MiCAiAH,  453. 

Mind:  the  mind  not  only  contemplates  unit  realities, 
as  they  exist,  but  has  the  gift,  by  an  act  of  creation, 
of  bringing  before  it  abstractions  and  generaliza- 
tions, which  have  no  existence,  no  counterpart,  out 
of  it,  9;  to  compare  and  to  contrast  are  among  the 
most  prominent  and  busy  of  our  intellectual  func- 
tions, 30;  instinctively,  even  though  unconsciously, 
we  are  ever  instituting  comparisons  between  the 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  127 

Mind:  continued. 

manifold  phenomena  of  the  external  world,  as  we 
meet  with  them,  criticizing,  referring  to  a  standard, 
collecting,  analyzing  them,  30;  we  are  ever  rising 
from  particulars  to  generals,  that  is,  from  images  to 
notions,  31;  what  is  concrete  exerts  a  force  and 
makes  an  impression  on  the  mind  which  nothing 
abstract  can  rival,  36;  the  mind  is  ever  stimulated 
in  proportion  to  the  cause  stimulating  it,  36;  en- 
largement of,  —  vide  Enlargement;  sometimes  our 
mind  changes  so  quickly,  so  unaccountably,  so  dis- 
proportionately to  any  tangible  arguments  to  which 
the  change  can  be  referred,  and  with  such  abiding 
recognition  of  the  force  of  the  old  arguments,  as  to 
suggest  the  suspicion  that  moral  causes,  arising  out 
of  our  condition,  age,  company,  occupations,  for- 
tunes, are  at  the  bottom,  168;  our  intellectual  nature 
is  under  laws,  and  the  correlative  of  ascertained 
truth  is  unreserved  assent,  170;  it  is  the  mind  that 
reasons  and  assents,  not  a  diagram  on  paper,  180 
(vide  Proof)  ;  habits  of  mind  may  grow,  as  being  a 
something  permanent  and  continuous,  185  (vide 
Assent);  the  mind  is  like  a  double  mirror,  in  which 
reflexions  of  self  within  self  multiply  themselves  till 
they  are  undistinguishable,  and  the  first  reflexion 
contains  all  the  rest,  195:  vide  Objections;  intro- 
spection of  the  operations  of  the  mind,  —  vide 
Introspection;  it  is  ever  exposed  to  the  danger  of 
being  carried  away  by  the  liveliness  of  its  concep- 


128  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Mind:  continued. 

tions,  to  the  sacrifice  of  good  sense  and  conscientious 
caution,  and  the  greater  and  the  more  rare  are  its 
gifts,  the  greater  is  the  risk  of  swerving  from  the 
line  of  reason  and  duty,  82;  it  is  ever  active,  inquisi- 
tive, penetrating;  it  examines  doctrine  and  doctrine; 
it  compares,  contrasts,  and  forms  them  into  a  science; 
that  science  is  theology,  147;  no  mind,  however 
large,  however  penetrating,  can  directly  and  fully 
by  one  act  understand  any  one  truth,  however 
simple,  151;  the  intellect,  which  is  made  for  truth, 
can  attain  truth,  and,  having  attained  it,  can  keep 
it,  can  recognize  it,  and  preserve  the  recognition, 
222;  it  is  plain  that,  if  what  may  be  called  functional 
disarrangements  of  the  intellect  are  to  be  considered 
fatal  to  the  recognition  of  the  functions  themselves, 
then  the  mind  has  no  laws  whatever  and  no  normal 
constitution;  there  is  a  growth  in  the  use  of  those 
faculties  by  which  knowledge  is  acquired,  232-3 
(vide  Act,  Function,  Self,  and  Man);  the  mind  is 
in  the  first  instance  in  disorder,  and  runs  wild,  233; 
vide  Certitude;  without  external  symbols  to  mark 
out  and  to  steady  its  course,  the  intellect  runs  wild, 
263;  the  mind  is  unequal  to  a  complete  analysis  of 
the  motives  which  carry  it  on  to  a  particular  con- 
clusion, and  is  swayed  and  determined  by  a  body 
of  proof,  which  it  recognizes  only  as  a  body,  and  not 
in  its  constituent  parts,  292;  the  mind  itself  is  more 
versatile  and  vigorous  than  any  of  its  works,  of 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  129 

Mind:  continued. 

which  language  is  one,  and  it  is  only  under  its  pene- 
trating and  subtle  action  that  the  margin  disappears, 
which  intervenes  between  verbal  argumentation 
and  conclusions  in  the  concrete,  360  (vide  Con- 
crete); it  determines  what  science  cannot  deter- 
mine, the  limit  of  converging  probabilities  and  the 
reasons  sufficient  for  a  proof,  360;  it  is  to  the  living 
mind  that  we  must  look  for  the  means  of  using 
correctly  principles  of  whatever  kind,  facts  or  doc- 
trines, experiences  or  testimonies,  true  or  probable, 
and  of  discerning  what  conclusion  from  these  is 
necessary,  suitable,  or  expedient,  when  they  are 
taken  for  granted;  and  this  either  by  means  of  a 
natural  gift,  or  from  mental  formation  and  practice 
and  a  long  familiarity  with  those  various  starting- 
points,  360-1  (vide  Man);  an  action  of  the  mind 
itself  is  not  less  necessary  in  relation  to  those  first 
elements  of  thought  which  in  all  reasoning  are 
assumptions,  the  principles,  tastes,  and  opinions, 
very  often  of  a  personal  character,  which  are  half 
the  battle  in  the  inference  with  which  the  reasoning 
is  to  terminate;  it  is  the  mind  itself  that  detects 
them  in  their  obscure  recesses,  illustrates  them, 
establishes  them,  eliminates  them,  resolves  them  into 
simpler  ideas,  as  the  case  may  be;  the  mind  contem- 
plates them  without  the  use  of  words,  by  a  process 
which  cannot  be  analyzed,  361;  thus  it  was  that 
Bacon  separated  the  physical  system  of  the  world 


130  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Mind:  continued. 

from  the  theological;  thus  that  Butler  connected 
together  the  moral  system  with  the  religious;  logical 
formulas  could  never  have  sustained  the  reasonings 
involved  in  such  investigations,  361;  that  a  special 
preparation  of  mind  is  required  for  each  separate 
department  of  inquiry  and  discussion  (excepting 
that  of  abstract  science)  is  strongly  insisted  upon  in 
the  Nicomachean  ethics,  414. 

Minds:  different  minds  throw  different  lights  upon 
the  same  theory  and  argument,  nay,  they  seem  to 
be  differing  in  detail  when  they  are  professing,  and 
in  reality  showing,  a  concurrence  in  it;  have  we 
never  found,  that,  when  a  friend  takes  up  the  de- 
fence of  what  we  have  written  or  said,  at  first  we 
are  unable  to  recognize  in  his  statement  of  it  what 
we  meant  it  to  convey?  309  (vide  Language). 

MiNucius:  quoted,  481. 

Miracles:  though  it  is  a  matter  of  faith  with  Catholics 
that  miracles  never  cease  in  the  Church,  still  that 
this  or  that  professed  miracle  really  took  place,  is  for 
the  most  part  only  a  matter  of  opinion,  201;  philos- 
ophers of  the  school  of  Hume  discard  the  very  sup- 
position of  miracles,  and  scornfully  refuse  to  hear 
evidence  in  their  behalf  in  given  instances,  81,  255; 
Hume  says  that  no  testimony  can  prove  a  miracle, 
since  we  have  no  experience  of  a  violation  of  natural 
laws,  and  much  experience  of  the  violation  of  truth; 
but  what  is  abstract  reasoning  to  a  question  of  con- 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  131 

Miracles:  continued. 

Crete  fact?  to  arrive  at  the  fact  of  any  matter,  we 
must  eschew  generalities,  and  take  things  as  they 
stand,  with  all  their  circumstances;  the  question  is 
not  about  miracles  in  general,  or  men  in  general, 
but  definitely,  whether  these  particular  miracles, 
ascribed  to  the  particular  Peter,  James,  and  John, 
are  more  likely  to  have  been  or  not;  whether  they 
are  unlikely,  supposing  that  there  is  a  Power,  ex- 
ternal to  the  world,  who  can  bring  them  about; 
supposing  they  are  the  only  means  by  which  He 
can  reveal  Himself  to  those  who  need  a  revelation; 
supposing  He  is  likely  to  reveal  Himself,  etc.,  306-7 
(vide  Laws  of  Nature);  if,  as  is  not  uncommon, 
unbelievers  mean  that  the  fact  of  an  established 
order  is  absolutely  fatal  to  the  very  notion  of  an 
exception,  they  are  using  a  presumption  as  if  it  were 
a  proof,  382;  to  the  unsophisticated  apprehension 
of  the  many,  the  successive  passages  of  life,  social 
or  political,  are  so  many  miracles,  if  that  is  to  be 
accounted  miraculous  which  brings  before  them  the 
immediate  Divine  Presence,  403;  all  professed  reve- 
lations have  been  attended,  in  one  shape  or  another, 
with  the  profession  of  miracles,  427. 

Mistakes:  most  men  will  recollect  in  their  past  years 
how  many  mistakes  they  have  made  about  persons, 
parties,  local  occurrences,  nations  and  the  like,  of 
which  at  the  time  they  had  no  knowledge  of  their 
own:  how  ashamed  or  how  amused  they  have  since 


132  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Mistakes:  continued. 

been  at  their  own  gratuitous  idealism  when  they 
came  into  possession  of  the  real  facts  concerning 
them,  32  (vide  Error). 

Modified  Assent:  a  modified  or  qualified  assent  is  an 
apparent  assent,  181-2. 

Monad:  of  the  Supreme  Being  it  is  safer  to  use  the 
word  "monad"  than  unit,  51. 

MoNAS,  125. 

Montaigne,  311,  312. 

Moral  Being:  truth  there  is,  and  attainable  it  is,  but 
its  rays  stream  in  upon  us  through  the  medium  of 
our  moral  as  well  as  our  intellectual  being;  and  in 
consequence  that  perception  of  its  first  principles 
which  is  natural  to  us  is  enfeebled,  obstructed,  per- 
verted, by  allurements  of  sense  and  the  supremacy 
of  self,  and,  on  the  other  hand,  quickened  by  aspira- 
tions after  the  supernatural,  311,  320  (vide  Truth, 
Man,  Criterion,  and  Informal  Inference). 

Moral  Certitude:  moral  evidence  and  moral  certi- 
tude are  all  that  we  can  attain,  not  only  in  the  case 
of  ethical  and  spiritual  subjects,  such  as  religion, 
but  of  terrestrial  and  cosmical  questions  also,  318; 
vide  Certitude. 

Moral  Experiences  which  perpetuate  themselves  in 
images  must  be  sought  after  in  order  to  be  found, 
and  encouraged  and  cultivated  in  order  to  be  ap- 
propriated, 87. 

Mosaic  System,  252,  432,  437,  487;  vide  Jews. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  133 

Moses,  185,  475. 

Mount,  Sermon  on  the,  448,  455. 

Mozart,  28. 

"Mimdum  tradidit  disputation!  eorum,"  237. 

Mure,  Colonel,  364,  366,  368,  369. 

Musc.E  Volitantes,  217. 

"My  kingdom  is  not  of  this  world,"  451. 

Mystery:  a  mystery  is  a  proposition  conveying  in- 
compatible notions,  or  is  a  statement  of  the  incon- 
ceivable; belief  in  a  mystery  can  be  more  than  an 
assertion;  we  can  assent  to  it,  for,  unless  we  in  some 
sense  apprehended  it,  we  should  not  recognize  it  to 
be  a  mystery,  that  is,  a  statement  uniting  incom- 
patible notions,  45-6;  words  which  make  nonsense 
do  not  make  a  mystery,  46;  the  assent  which  we 
give  to  mysteries,  as  such,  is  notional  assent;  for, 
by  the  supposition,  it  is  assent  to  propositions  which 
we  cannot  conceive,  46;  processes  of  inference,  how- 
ever accurate,  can  end  in  mystery;  first,  because 
our  notion  of  a  thing  may  be  only  partially  faithful 
to  the  original;  it  may  be  in  excess  of  the  thing,  or 
it  may  represent  it  incompletely,  and,  in  consequence, 
it  may  serve  for  it,  it  may  stand  for  it,  only  to  a 
certain  point,  in  certain  cases,  but  no  further;  after 
that  point  is  reached,  the  notion  and  the  thing  part 
company;  this  is  seen  familiarly  in  the  use  of  meta- 
phors, and  in  the  use  of  certain  scientific  definitions 
or  formulas,  and  in  certain  enigmatical  sayings 
(vide  Enigmas),  and  also  in  algebra,  when  applied 


134  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Mystery:  continued. 

to  geometry  (vide  Algebra),  46-9;  secondly,  be- 
cause our  notions  of  things  are  sometimes  a  mistake 
ah  initio;  we  are  accustomed  to  subject  all  that  exists 
to  numeration;  but  to  be  correct,  we  are  bound  first 
to  reduce  to  some  level  of  possible  comparison  the 
things  which  we  wish  to  number;  this  illustrated  in 
the  case  of  certain  predicates  which  are  applied  to 
Napoleon,  and  in  the  case  of  the  Angels;  but  this 
applies  much  more  to  our  speculations  concerning 
the  Supreme  Being  (vide  God),  49-50;  vide  Notion; 
our  notion  of  space  lodges  us  in  a  mystery,  as  also 
does  our  notion  of  the  infinitude  of  the  Divine  At- 
tributes, 51-2. 

Mythology,  Greek,  was  for  the  most  part  cheerful 
and  graceful,  395. 

N 

Napoleon:  29,  33,  49,  50,  198,  339:  his  genius  in  mili- 
tary matters,  334;  the  arms  fell  from  the  hands  of 
his  soldiers,  428;  his  words  on  the  power  of  the  Name 
of  the  Redeemer,  490-1. 

"Nascitur,  non  fit,"  331. 

Nathanael,  450. 

National  Defences:  when  the  Duke  of  Wellington 
wrote  his  letter  on  the  subject  of  the  national  de- 
fences, all  classes  of  the  community  recognized  the 
truth  of  his  words;  yet  few  could  be  said  to  see  or 
feel  that  truth;   but   eleven  years  afterwards  the 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  135 

National  Defences:  continued. 

anger  of  the  French  colonels  with  us,  after  the 
attempt  upon  Louis  Napoleon's  life,  transferred  its 
facts  to  the  charge  of  the  imagination,  76-7. 

Natural,  —  vide  Universal. 

Natural  Inference:  natural  or  material  inference, 
i.e.,  the  mode  in  which  we  ordinarily  reason,  is  not 
from  propositions  to  propositions,  but  from  things 
to  things,  from  concrete  to  concrete,  from  wholes 
to  wholes  (vide  Reasoning);  not  only  is  the  infer- 
ence with  its  process  ignored,  but  the  antecedent 
also;  to  the  mind  itself  the  reasoning  is  a  simple 
divination  or  prediction;  we  deal  with  things  directly; 
and  as  they  stand,  one  by  one,  in  the  concrete,  with 
an  intrinsic  and  personal  power,  not  a  conscious 
adoption  of  an  artificial  instrument  or  expedient; 
and  it  is  especially  exemplified  both  in  uneducated 
men  and  in  men  of  genius,  330-1;  this  unscientific 
reasoning,  being  sometimes  a  natural,  uncultivated 
faculty,  sometimes  approaching  to  a  gift,  sometimes 
an  acquired  habit  and  second  nature,  has  a  higher 
source  than  logical  rule,  —  "nascitur,  non  fit"; 
when  it  is  characterized  by  precision,  subtlety, 
promptitude,  and  truth,  it  is  a  gift  and  a  rarity;  in 
ordinary  minds  it  is  biassed  and  degraded  by  preju- 
dice, passion,  and  self-interest  (vide  Moral  Being, 
and  Truth)  ;  it  comes  by  nature,  and  belongs  to  all 
of  us  in  a  measure,  to  women  more  than  to  men,  331 ; 
this  illustrated  by  the  instance  of  a  peasant  who  is 


136  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Natural  Inference:  continued. 

weather-wise,  of  physicians  who  excel  in  the  diag- 
nosis of  complaints,  of  a  lawyer  who  "would  know, 
almost  by  instinct,  whether  an  accused  person  was 
or  was  not  guilty,"  of  experts  and  detectives,  and 
of  certain  men  who  possess  an  intuitive  perception 
of  character,  332;  sometimes  this  illative  faculty 
is  nothing  short  of  genius,  as  in  the  case  of  Newton, 
of  calculating  boys,  and  of  Napoleon,  333-4;  such 
clear  presentiments  may  be  called  instinct,  if  by 
instinct  be  understood  a  perception  of  facts  without 
assignable  media  of  perceiving;  the  immediate  per- 
ception of  what  is  conducive  or  injurious  to  one's 
welfare,  presence  of  mind,  fathoming  of  motives, 
talent  for  repartee,  and  that  divination  of  personal 
danger  which  is  found  in  the  young  and  innocent, 
are  instances  of  this  gift,  334-5;  the  grounds,  on 
which  we  hold  the  divine  origin  of  the  Church,  and 
the  previous  truths  which  are  taught  us  by  nature 
—  the  being  of  a  God,  and  the  immortality  of  the 
soul  —  are  felt  by  most  men  to  be  recondite  and 
impalpable,  in  proportion  to  their  depth  and  reality; 
as  we  cannot  see  ourselves,  so  w^e  cannot  well  see 
intellectual  motives  which  are  so  intimately  ours, 
and  which  spring  up  from  the  very  constitution  of 
our  minds,  336;  this  is  found  in  the  case  of  other 
perceptions  besides  that  of  faith,  and  is  illustrated 
in  the  instance  of  calculating  boys  and  of  men  who 
have  the  gift  of  playing  on  an  instrument  by  ear, 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  137 

Natural  Inference:  continued. 

336;  there  is  an  analogy,  in  this  respect,  between 
ratiocination  and  memory,  336-7  (vide  Memory); 
what  is  called  reasoning  is  often  only  a  peculiar  and 
personal  mode  of  abstraction;  it  is  a  power  of  looking 
at  things  in  some  particular  aspect,  and  of  deter- 
mining their  internal  and  external  relations  thereby; 
thus  a  word  or  an  act  on  the  part  of  another  is  some- 
times a  sudden  revelation;  light  breaks  in  upon  us, 
and  our  whole  judgment  of  a  course  of  events,  or  of 
an  undertaking,  is  changed;  another  may  see  the 
objects  which  we  are  thus  using,  and  give  them 
quite  a  different  interpretation,  inasmuch  as  he 
abstracts  another  set  of  general  notions  from  those 
same  phenomena  which  present  themselves  to  us 
also,  337-8;  there  is  an  obvious  analogy  between 
ratiocination  and  taste,  338  (vide  Taste);  this 
faculty  of  natural  and  spontaneous  ratiocination  is 
attached  to  a  definite  subject-matter,  according  to 
the  individual;  it  is  not  so  much  one  faculty  as  a 
collection  of  similar  or  analogous  faculties  under 
one  name,  there  being  really  as  many  faculties  as 
there  are  distinct  subject-matters,  338-9,  414  (vide 
Virtue);  thus  it  is  almost  proverbial  that  a  hard- 
headed  mathematician  may  have  no  head  at  all  for 
what  is  called  historical  evidence;  a  shrewd  man  of 
business  may  be  a  bad  arguer  in  philosophical  ques- 
tions, etc.,  339-40;  in  this  respect  it  resembles 
memory  and  virtue,  340-1  (vide  Memory);  instead 


138  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Natural  Inference:  continued. 

of  trusting  logical  science,  we  must  trust  persons, 
namely,  those  who  by  long  acquaintance  with  their 
subject  have  a  right  to  judge;  and  if  we  wish  our- 
selves to  share  in  their  convictions  and  the  grounds 
of  them,  we  must  follow  their  history,  and  learn  as 
they  have  learned,  341-2. 

Natural  Religion:  there  are  three  main  channels 
which  Nature  furnishes  for  our  acquiring  the  knowl- 
edge of  God,  of  His  Will,  and  of  our  duties  towards 
Him,  viz.,  our  own  minds,  the  voice  of  mankind, 
and  the  course  of  the  world,  that  is,  of  human  life 
and  human  affairs;  these  teach  us  the  Being  and 
Attributes  of  God,  our  responsibility  to  Him,  our  de- 
pendence on  Him,  our  prospect  of  reward  or  punish- 
ment; the  most  authoritative  of  these  three  means 
of  knowledge,  as  being  specially  our  own,  is  our  own 
mind,  whose  informations  give  us  the  rule  by  which 
we  test,  interpret,  and  correct  what  is  presented  to 
us  for  belief,  whether  by  the  universal  testimony  of 
mankind,  or  by  the  history  of  society  and  of  the 
world,  389;  vide  Religion,  and  Conscience;  w^her- 
ever  religion  exists  in  a  popular  shape,  it  has  almost 
invariably  worn  its  dark  side  outwards;  it  is  founded 
in  one  way  or  other  on  the  sense  of  sin;  and  without 
that  vivid  sense  it  would  hardly  have  any  precepts 
or  any  observances;  its  many  varieties  all  proclaim 
or  imply  that  man  is  in  a  degraded,  servile  condition, 
and    requires    expiation,    reconciliation,    and   some 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  139 

Natural  Religion:  continued. 
great  change  of  nature;  this  is  suggested  to  us  by 
the  accounts  of  a  realm  of  light  and  a  realm  of  dark- 
ness, of  an  elect  fold  and  a  regenerate  state,  by  the 
almost  ubiquitous  and  ever-recurring  institution  of 
a  Priesthood,  and  by  the  doctrine  of  future  punish- 
ment, and  that  eternal,  392,  400,  487;  the  most 
remarkable  of  these  rites  and  doctrines  is  that  of 
atonement,  392  (vide  Atonement)  ;  these  ceremonial 
acknowledgments  imply  a  brighter  as  well  as  a 
threatening  aspect  of  Natural  Religion;  for  they 
show  that  men  have  some  hope  of  attaining  to  a 
better  condition  than  their  present,  393-4;  the 
religion  of  so-called  civilization  has  not  legitimately 
a  part  in  the  delineation  of  Natural  Religion;  for  it 
is  not  a  development  of  man's  whole  nature,  but 
mainly  of  the  intellect,  recognizing  indeed  the  moral 
sense,  but  ignoring  the  conscience;  and  it  contra- 
dicts informants  which  speak  w^ith  greater  authority 
than  itself,  395-6,  400;  as  regards  the  third  natural 
informant  on  the  subject  of  Religion,  i.e.,  the  system 
and  the  course  of  the  w^orld,  with  our  best  efforts 
we  can  only  glean  from  it  some  faint  and  fragmentary 
view^s  of  God,  396-7;  there  is  only  a  choice  of  alter- 
natives in  explanation  of  so  critical  a  fact :  —  either 
there  is  no  Creator,  or  He  has  disowned  His  crea- 
tures; my  true  informant,  my  burdened  conscience, 
gives  me  at  once  the  true  answer:  —  it  pronounces 
without   any   misgiving  that   God   exists:  —  and   it 


140  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Natural  Religion:  continued. 

pronounces  quite  as  surely  that  I  am  alienated  from 
Him;  thus  it  solves  the  world's  mystery,  and  sees  in 
that  mystery  only  a  confirmation  of  its  own  original 
teaching,  397-8;  vide  Evil;  the  severe  aspect  of 
natural  Religion  is  the  most  prominent  aspect, 
because  the  multitude  of  men  follow  their  own 
likings  and  wills,  and  not  the  decisions  of  their 
sense  of  right  and  wrong;  to  them  Religion  is  a  mere 
yoke,  400;  all  Religion,  so  far  as  it  is  genuine,  is  a 
blessing.  Natural  as  well  as  Revealed,  400;  troubled 
as  are  the  existing  relations  between  God  and  man, 
there  are  other  general  laws  which  govern  those 
relations,  and  they  speak  another  language,  and 
compensate  for  what  is  stern  in  the  teaching  of 
nature,  without  tending  to  deny  that  sternness;  the 
first  of  these  laws  is  the  very  fact  that  religious 
beliefs  and  institutions  are  of  such  general  accept- 
ance in  all  times  and  places;  men  would  not  subject 
themselves  to  the  tyranny  which  Lucretius  de- 
nounces, unless  they  had  either  experience  or  hope 
of  benefits  to  themselves  by  so  doing;  and  hope  of 
future  good  sweetens  all  suffering,  400-1;  moreover, 
they  have  an  earnest  of  that  future  in  the  real  and 
recurring  blessings  of  life,  the  enjoyment  of  the  gifts 
of  the  earth,  and  of  domestic  affection  and  social 
intercourse,  reminding  them  that  they  are  not 
utterly  cast  off  by  God,  401;  the  great  majority  of 
men  recognize  the  Hand  of  unseen  power,  directing 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  141 

Natural  Religion:  continued. 

in  mercy  or  in  judgment  the  phy&ical  and  moral 
system;  good  to  the  good,  and  evil  to  the  evil,  is 
instinctively  felt  to  be  the  universal  rule  of  God's 
dealings  with  us;  hence  come  the  great  proverbs, 
indigenous  in  both  Christian  and  heathen  nations, 
402-3;  the  spontaneous  acts  and  proceedings  of  our 
race,  as  viewed  on  a  large  field,  show  that  prayer, 
as  well  as  hope,  is  a  constituent  of  man's  religion; 
and,  where  prayer  is,  there  is  a  natural  relief  and 
solace  in  all  trouble,  great  or  ordinary,  403  (vide 
Prayer);  the  contrarieties  of  prayers  and  rites  do 
not  come  into  the  idea  of  religion,  as  such,  at  all, 
403  (vide  Universal);  the  Religion  of  Nature  has 
not  been  a  deduction  of  reason,  or  the  joint,  volun- 
tary manifesto  of  a  multitude  meeting  together  and 
pledging  themselves  to  each  other,  but  it  has  been  a 
tradition  or  an  interposition  vouchsafed  to  a  people 
from  above;  the  notion  of  a  revelation  is  congenial 
to  the  human  mind,  so  that  the  expectation  of  it 
may  truly  be  considered  an  integral  part  of  Natural 
Religion,  404-5;  the  notion  of  sacrifice,  as  well  as 
the  notion  of  divine  interpositions,  may  be  con- 
sidered almost  an  integral  part  of  the  Religion  of 
Nature,  and  an  alleviation  of  its  gloom,  405  (vide 
Sacrifice,  and  Atonement);  the  doctrine  of  meri- 
torious intercession  is  proper  to  Natural  Religion, 
and  lightens  the  prophecies  of  evil  in  which  it  is 
founded,   407    (vide   Meritorious   Intercession); 


142  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Natural  Religion:  continued. 

Natural  Religion  is  possible  to  us  independently  of 
Revelation,  and  is  the  preparation  for  it;  though  in 
Christians  themselves  it  cannot  really  be  separated 
from  their  Christianity,  and  never  is  possessed  in 
its  higher  forms  in  any  people  without  some  portion 
of  those  inward  aids  which  Christianity  imparts  to 
us,  408;  the  infinite  goodness  of  God  and  our  own 
extreme  misery  and  need  are  two  doctrines  which 
are  the  primary  constituents  of  Natural  Religion, 
423  (vide  Revealed  Religion,  and  Christianity); 
it  is  a  mere  inchoation,  and  needs  a  complement,  — 
it  can  have  but  one  complement,  and  that  very 
complement  is  Christianity,  487;  it  is  based  upon 
the  sense  of  sin;  it  recognizes  the  disease,  but  it 
cannot  find,  it  does  but  look  out  for  the  remedy; 
that  remedy,  both  for  guilt  and  for  moral  impotence, 
is  found  in  the  central  doctrine  of  Revelation,  the 
Mediation  of  Christ,  487. 

Nature:  laws  of  nature,  —  vide  Laws  of  Nature; 
each  thing  has  its  own  nature  and  its  own  history; 
when  the  nature  and  the  history  of  many  things  are 
similar,  we  say  that  they  have  the  same  nature;  but 
there  is  no  such  thing  as  one  and  the  same  nature; 
they  are  each  of  them  itself,  not  identical,  but  like, 
280  (vide  Universals)  ;  one's  own  nature,  —  vide 
Self;  nature  and  art  should  be  combined,  but  some- 
times they  are  incompatible;  thus,  in  the  case  of 
calculating  boys,  it  is  said  that  to  teach  them  the 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  143 

Nature:  continued. 
ordinary  rules  of  arithmetic  is  to  endanger  or  to 
destroy  the  extraordinary  endowment,  336;  nature 
has  an  intrinsic  claim  upon  us  to  be  obeyed  and 
used,  388. 

Nazareth,  448. 

Neptune:  when  the  planet  Neptune  was  discovered, 
it  was  deservedly  considered  a  triumph  of  science, 
that  abstract  reasonings  had  done  so  much  towards 
determining  the  planet  and  its  orbit;  there  would 
have  been  no  triumph  in  success,  had  there  been  no 
hazard  of  failure,  278;  vide  Jupiter. 

Nero,  469. 

New  Testament:  449;  St.  John  and  St.  Paul  are  the 
two  chief  writers  of  the  New  Testament,  137. 

Newman,  F.  W.:  quoted,  365. 

Newton:  102,  230,  298,  320,  339,  340,  341,  446;  quoted, 
322;  the  proof  of  his  rule  for  ascertaining  the  imagi- 
nary roots  of  equations  was  discovered  by  Professor 
Sylvester,  333. 

Nic^A,  Council  of:  142,  144;  w^ords  of,  quoted,  146. 

Nicene  Creed:  132,  246;  it  is  a  popular  form  of  faith, 
suited  to  every  age,  class,  and  condition;  its  declara- 
tions are  categorical,  brief,  clear,  elementary,  of  the 
first  importance,  expressive  of  the  concrete,  the 
objects  of  real  apprehension,  and  the  basis  and  rule 
of  devotion,  144. 

Nicolas,  M.,  489  note. 

Nicomachean  Ethics:  353  note;  quoted,  341,  414-15. 


144  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Niebuhr:  364,  369,  370,  371;  prescription  together 
with  internal  consistency  was  to  him  the  evidence 
of  fact,  365. 

"No  man  can  come  to  Me,  except  the  Father,  who 
hath  sent  Me,  draw  him,"  451. 

Noah,  376. 

Nonsense,  —  vide  Mystery. 

North  and  South:  quoted,  312. 

Norway,  294. 

"Not  many  wise  men  according  to  the  flesh,"  etc.,  467. 

Notion:  [this  word  is  used  repeatedly  in  the  Grammar 
OF  Assent  in  the  sense  of  a  notional  proposition]; 
our  notion  of  a  thing  may  be  only  partially  faithful  to 
the  original,  46,  51,  52  (vide  Mystery);  our  notions 
of  things  are  never  simply  commensurate  with  the 
things  themselves;  they  are  aspects  of  them,  more 
or  less  exact,  and  sometimes  a  mistake  ab  initio,  49, 
52;  the  free  deductions  from  one  of  these  aspects 
necessarily  contradict  the  free  deductions  from  an- 
other, 52 ;  an  alleged  fact  is  not  therefore  impossible 
because  it  is  inconceivable;  for  the  incompatible 
notions,  in  which  consists  its  inconceivableness, 
need  not  each  of  them  really  belong  to  it  in 
that  fulness  which  would  involve  their  being  in- 
compatible with  each  other;  I  deny  the  possibility 
of  two  straight  lines  enclosing  a  space,  on  the  ground 
of  its  being  inconceivable;  but  I  do  so  because  a 
straight  line  is  a  notion  and  nothing  more,  and  not 
a  thing  to  which  I  may  have  attached  a  notion  more 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  145 

Notion:  continued. 
or   less    unfaithful,    51;    vide   Statement    of   the 
Case. 

Notional  Apprehension:  notional  apprehension  is 
the  apprehension  with  which  we  infer  or  assent  to 
notional  propositions,  9,  22-3  (vide  Apprehension, 
and  Real  Apprehension)  ;  in  notional  apprehension 
we  regard  things,  not  as  they  are  in  themselves,  but 
mainly  as  they  stand  in  relation  to  each  other; 
''man"  is  no  longer  what  he  really  is,  an  individual 
presented  to  us  by  our  senses,  but  as  we  read  him  in 
the  light  of  those  comparisons  and  contrasts  which 
we  have  made  him  suggest  to  us;  his  appellation 
is  made  to  suggest,  not  the  real  being  which  he  is  in 
this  or  that  specimen  of  himself,  but  a  definition,  31 
(vide  Mind);  vide  Words,  and  Language;  words 
which  are  used  by  an  eye-witness  to  express  things, 
unless  he  be  especially  eloquent  or  graphic,  may 
only  convey  general  notions;  such  is,  and  ever  must 
be,  the  popular  and  ordinary  mode  of  apprehend- 
ing language,  33;   notional  and  real  apprehension, 

—  vide  Apprehension,  Notional  and  Real. 
Notional  Assent:  notional  assent  is  an  assent  given 

to  a  notion,  39  (vide  Notion);  vide  Profession, 
Credence,  Opinion,  Presumption,  and  Specula- 
tion; notional  and  real  assent,  —  vide  Assent, 
Notional  and  Real;  notional  assent  and  inference, 

—  vide  Inference  and  Notional  Assent. 
Notional  Proposition:  a  notional  proposition  is  a 


146  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Notional  Proposition:  continued. 

proposition  in  which  one  or  both  of  the  terms  are 
common  nouns,  as  standing  for  what  is  abstract, 
general,  and  non-existing,  such  as  "Man  is  an  ani- 
mal," 9  (vide  Proposition);  vide  Language. 

Noun:  the  terms  of  a  proposition  do  or  do  not  stand 
for  things;  if  they  do,  then  they  are  singular  terms, 
for  all  things  that  are,  are  units;  but  if  they  do  not 
stand  for  things  they  must  stand  for  notions,  and 
are  common  terms;  singular  nouns  come  from 
experience,  common  from  abstraction,  22-3  (vide 
Proposition). 

"Now  we  believe,  not  for  thy  saying,"  etc.,  386. 

Numeration:  we  are  accustomed  to  subject  all  that 
exists  to  numeration;  but,  to  be  correct,  we  are 
bound  first  to  reduce  to  some  level  of  possible  com- 
parison the  things  which  we  wish  to  number,  49 
(vide  Mystery). 

o 

Object:  the  strong  object  makes  the  apprehension 
strong,  36  (vide  Apprehension,  Apprehension, 
Notional  and  Real,  and  Concrete);  the  evidence 
which  we  have  of  the  presence  of  the  individual 
beings  which  surround  us  lies  in  the  phenomena 
which  address  our  senses,  and  our  warrant  for  taking 
these  for  evidence  is  our  instinctive  certitude  that 
they  are  evidence  (vide  Substance)  ;  and  so  of  those 
intellectual  and   moral   objects  which  are  brought 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  147 

Object:  continued. 

home  to  us  through  our  senses :  —  that  they  exist, 
we  know  by  instinct;  that  they  are  such  and  such, 
we  apprehend  from  the  impressions  which  they 
leave  upon  our  minds,  102-3. 

Objections:  objections,  as  such,  have  no  direct  force 
to  weaken  assent;  but,  when  they  multiply,  they 
tell  against  the  implicit  reasonings  or  the  formal 
inferences  which  are  its  warrant,  and  suspend  its 
acts  and  gradually  undermine  its  habit,  194;  vide 
Act;  objections  and  difficulties  tell  upon  the  mind; 
it  may  lose  its  elasticity,  and  be  unable  to  throw 
them  off;  and  thus,  even  as  regards  things  which  it 
may  be  absurd  to  doubt,  we  may,  in  consequence 
of  some  past  suggestion  of  the  possibility  of  error, 
or  of  some  chance  association  to  their  disadvantage, 
be  teazed  from  time  to  time  and  hampered  by  in- 
voluntary questionings,  as  if  we  were  not  certain, 
when  we  are,  217  (vide  Mind). 

Objective,  —  vide  Truth. 

"Obscurum  per  obscurius,"  304. 

Occasional  Sermons,  Newman's,  425  note. 

Old  Testament:  393,  427,  440,  441,  448,  454;  all 
through  the  Old  Testament  the  theological  formula, 
"The  Messias  is  God,"  gives  an  interpretation  and 
a  persuasive  power  to  many  passages  and  portions, 
especially  of  the  Psalms  and  the  Prophets,  139. 

Olympiads,  363. 

"  Omnibus  umbra 


148  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Omnipresence  of  God:  from  the  recurring  instances 
in  which  conscience  acts,  forcing  upon  us  impor- 
tunately the  mandate  of  a  Superior,  we  have  fresh 
and  fresh  evidence  of  the  existence  of  a  Sovereign 
Ruler,  from  whom  those  particular  dictates  which 
we  experience  proceed;  so  that  we  may,  by  means 
of  that  induction  from  particular  experiences  of 
conscience,  have  as  good  a  warrant  for  concluding 
the  Ubiquitous  Presence  of  One  Supreme  Master, 
as  we  have,  from  parallel  experience  of  sense,  for 
assenting  to  the  fact  of  a  multiform  and  vast  world, 
material  and  mental,  63;  this  assent  is  notional, 
because  we  generalize  a  consistent,  methodical  form 
of  Divine  Unity  and  Personality  with  Its  attributes, 
from  particular  experiences  of  the  religious  instinct, 
63  (vide  Conscience). 

"One,"  as  applied  to  God,  —  vide  God. 

Opinion:  various  meanings  of  the  word,  58;  opinion  is 
used  in  the  Grammar  of  Assent  to  denote  an  assent 
to  a  proposition,  not  as  true,  but  as  probably  true, 
that  is,  to  the  probability  of  that  which  the  proposi- 
tion enunciates,  58,  175;  as  that  probability  may 
vary  in  strength  without  limit,  so  may  the  cogency 
and  moment  of  the  opinion,  58,  175  (vide  Prob- 
ability) ;  opinion  differs  from  inference  in  this,  that, 
being  an  assent,  it  is  independent  of  premisses;  we 
have  opinions  which  we  never  think  of  defending 
by  argument,  though,  of  course,  we  think  they  can 
be  so  defended;  whereas  inference  is  in  its  nature 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  149 

Opinion:  continued. 

and  by  its  profession  conditional  and  uncertain,  59; 
opinion  differs  from  credence  in  these  two  points, 
viz.,  that,  while  opinion  explicitly  assents  to  the 
probability  of  a  given  proposition,  credence  is  an 
implicit  assent  to  its  truth;  moreover,  opinion  is 
a  reflex  act;  —  when  we  take  a  thing  for  granted, 
we  have  credence  in  it;  when  we  begin  to  reflect 
upon  our  credence,  and  to  measure,  estimate,  and 
modify  it,  then  we  are  forming  an  opinion,  59;  it  is 
in  this  sense  that  Catholics  speak  of  theological 
opinion,  in  contrast  with  faith  in  dogma;  it  is  much 
more  than  an  inferential  act,  but  it  is  distinct  from 
an  act  of  certitude;  and  this  is  really  the  sense  which 
Protestants  give  to  the  word  when  they  interpret 
it  by  conviction;  for  their  highest  opinion  in  relig- 
ion is,  generally  speaking,  an  assent  to  a  proba- 
bility, 59. 

Orator:  it  is  the  least  pardonable  fault  in  an  orator 
to  fail  in  clearness  of  style,  21. 

Order:  as  all  things  in  the  universe  are  unit  and  in- 
dividual, order  implies  a  certain  repetition,  whether 
of  things  or  like  things,  or  of  their  affections  and 
relations,  69;  as  a  cause  implies  a  will,  so  order 
implies  a  purpose,  72 ;  order  of  nature,  —  vide  Laws 
OF  Nature. 

Organum  Investigandi,  499,  316. 

Origen:  483;  quoted,  475-6,  486. 

Originality  in  thinking  is  the  discovery  of  an  aspect 


150  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Originality:  continued. 

of  a  subject-matter,  simpler,  it  may  be,  and  more 
intelligible  than  any  hitherto  taken,  372. 

Orleans  Family,  456. 

Orley  Farm:  quoted,  332. 

Ourselves,  —  vide  Self. 

"Out  of  the  eater  came  forth  meat/'  etc.,  48. 

Oxford  Spy:  quoted,  47. 

P 

Paine,  378  (vide  Revelation). 

Palatine  Hill,  219. 

Palestine,  485. 

Paley:  Paley,  in  his  Evidences  of  Christianity,  postu- 
lates, for  his  proof  of  its  miracles,  only  thus  much, 
that,  under  the  circumstances  of  the  case,  a  revela- 
tion is  not  improbable;  this  mode  of  argument  is 
like  a  legal  proceeding,  which  is  suspicious  in  ques- 
tions of  history  or  of  philosophy,  424  (vide  Court); 
men  are  too  well  inclined  to  sit  at  home,  instead  of 
stirring  themselves  to  inquire  whether  a  revelation 
has  been  given;  they  expect  its  evidences  to  come 
to  them  without  their  trouble;  they  act,  not  as  sup- 
pliants, but  as  judges;  modes  of  argument  such  as 
Paley's,  encourage  this  state  of  mind;  they  allow 
men  to  forget  that  revelation  is  a  boon,  not  a  debt 
on  the  part  of  the  Giver;  they  treat  it  as  a  mere 
historical  phenomenon,  425-6  (vide  Truth,  Con- 
scientiousness, and  Moral  Being);  he  argues  on 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  151 

Paley:  continued. 

the  principle  that  the  credentials,  which  ascertain 
for  us  a  message  from  above,  are  necessarily  in  their 
nature  miraculous,  427;  quoted,  on  the  appeal  to 
miraculous  power  made  by  the  early  Christian 
writers,  460-1. 

Pantaleon,  St.,  201. 

Pantheistic  Science,  241. 

Parliament,  173. 

Parnell:  poem  of,  referred  to,  421. 

Parson,  32. 

Parthenon,  219. 

Pascal:  230;  on  the  establishment  of  Christianity, 
307-8;  on  scepticism,  310-11. 

Pathology,  —  vide  Medicine. 

Paul,  St.:  137,  200,  250,  252,  423,  452,  469;  quoted, 
453,  466,  467;  how  burning  are  St.  Paul's  words  when 
he  speaks  of  our  Lord's  crucifixion  and  death!  what 
is  the  secret  of  that  flame,  but  this  dogmatic  sen- 
tence, "The  Son  is  God"?  why  should  the  death  of 
the  Son  be  more  awful  than  any  other  death,  except 
that  He,  though  man,  was  God?  139;  St.  Paul  at 
Athens  appeals  to  the  "  Unknown  God,"  388. 

"  Peace  to  men  of  good  will,"  415. 

Peasant  who  is  weather-wise  may  yet  be  simply 
unable  to  assign  intelligible  reasons  why  he  thinks 
it  will  be  fine  to-morrow,  332. 

Peel,  Sir  Robert:  91,  93;  quoted,  94. 

Penny  Cyclopcedia:  quoted,  392-3. 


152  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Pentecost:  the  breviary  offices  for  Pentecost  and  its 
Octave  are  the  grandest,  perhaps,  in  the  whole  year, 
140. 

IXeTratScu/xeVos  investigator,  498. 

Perception:  let  the  proposition  to  which  the  assent 
is  given  be  as  absolutely  true  as  the  reflex  act  pro- 
nounces it  to  be,  that  is,  objectively  true  as  well  as 
subjectively:  —  then  the  assent  may  be  called  a 
perception,  195-6. 

Peregrinus,  462. 

Perpetua,  St.,  477. 

Persistence  of  certitude,  220  (vide  Indefectibility). 

Personal:  a  proof,  except  in  abstract  demonstration, 
has  always  in  it,  more  or  less,  an  element  of  the  per- 
sonal, 317,  320  (vide  Proof,  Moral  Being,  and 
Truth)  ;  men  become  personal  when  logic  fails,  369 
(vide  Logic). 

Persons:  all  concrete  laws  are  general,  and  persons, 
as  such,  do  not  fall  under  laws,  255  (vide  Indi- 
vidual); vide  Heart. 

Petavius:  quoted,  422  note. 

Peter,  St.:  467,  469;  quoted,  466. 

Peter,  boy  of  the  imperial  bedchamber,  484. 

Peveril  of  the  Peak:  quoted,  335. 

Phenomena:  the  evidence  which  we  have  of  the  pres- 
ence of  the  individual  beings  which  surround  us  lies 
in  the  phenomena  which  address  our  senses,  and  our 
warrant  for  taking  these  for  evidence  is  our  instinc- 
tive certitude  that   they  are  evidence,    102    (vide 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  153 

Phenomena:  continued. 

Substance,  and  Instinct);  the  phenomena  are  as 
if  pictures;  but  at  the  same  time  they  give  us  no 
exact  measure  or  character  of  the  unknown  things 
beyond  them;  when  we  speak  of  our  having  a  pic- 
ture of  the  things  which  are  perceived  through  the 
senses,  we  mean  a  certain  representation,  true  as 
far  as  it  goes,  but  not  adequate,  103  (vide  Object)  ; 
phenomena  of  conscience,  —  vide  Conscience. 

Phidias,  357. 

Philanthropist,  32. 

Philip,  10. 

Philippi,  10. 

Phillipps'  Law  of  Evidence:  quoted,  324. 

Philopatris,  the  author  of:  quoted,  468. 

Philosopher:  in  a  philosopher  it  is  a  merit  even  to  be 
not  utterly  vague,  inchoate,  and  obscure  in  his  teach- 
ing, and  if  he  fails  even  of  this  low  standard  of 
language,  we  remind  ourselves  that  his  obscurity 
perhaps  is  owing  to  his  depth,  21  (vide  Psychol- 
ogy); I  have  no  confidence  in  philosophers  who 
cannot  help  being  religious,  and  are  Christians  by 
implication;  they  sit  at  home,  and  reach  forward  to 
distances  which  astonish  us;  but  they  hit  without 
grasping,  and  are  sometimes  as  confident  about 
shadows  as  about  realities,  93  (vide  Paley);  a 
philosopher  should  so  anticipate  the  application, 
and  guard  the  enunciation  of  his  principles,  as  to 
secure  them  against  the  risk  of  their  being  made  to 


154  ^A^  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS    OF 

Philosopher  :  continued. 

change  places  with  each  other,  to  defend  what  he 
is  eager  to  denounce,  and  to  condemn  what  he  finds 
it  necessary  to  sanction,  164;  an  idea  has  possessed 
certain  philosophers  that  miracles  are  an  infringe- 
ment and  disfigurement  of  the  beautiful  order  of 
nature;  and  there  is  a  persuasion,  common  among 
political  and  literary  men,  that  the  Catholic  Church 
is  inconsistent  with  the  true  interests  of  the  human 
race;  a  renunciation  of  these  imaginations  is  not  a 
change  in  certitudes,  255;  vide  Lawyer. 

Philosophy:  no  religion  yet  has  been  a  religion  of 
physics  or  of  philosophy,  96  (vide  Knowledge,  and 
Science);  the  so-called  religion  of  civilization  and 
philosophy  is  a  great  mockery,  400;  for  it  has  no 
sympathy  either  with  the  hopes  and  fears  of  the 
awakened  soul,  or  with  those  frightful  presentiments 
which  are  expressed  in  the  worship  and  traditions 
of  the  heathen,  396  (vide  Natural  Religion). 

Phronesis:  Aristotle  calls  the  faculty  which  guides 
the  mind  in  matters  of  conduct  by  the  name  of 
'phronesis,  or  judgment,  353-4  (vide  Conduct);  it 
is  the  regulating  principle  of  every  one  of  the  virtues, 
356;  properly  speaking,  there  are  as  many  kinds  of 
phronesis  as  there  are  virtues;  for  the  judgment, 
good  sense,  or  tact  which  is  conspicuous  in  a  man's 
conduct  in  one  subject-matter  is  not  necessarily 
traceable  in  another;  he  may  be  great  in  one  as- 
pect of  his  character,  and  little-minded  in  another^ 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  155 

Phronesis  :  continued. 

356-7  (vide  Memory,  Virtue,  and  Natural  Infer- 
ence). 

^p6v7}aLs,  353  note. 

Physician:  there  are  physicians  who  excel  in  the 
diagnosis  of  complaints;  though  it  does  not  follow 
from  this,  that  they  could  defend  their  decision  in  a 
particular  case  against  a  brother  physician  who 
disputed  it;  they  are  guided  by  natural  acuteness 
and  varied  experience;  they  have  their  own  idiosyn- 
cratic modes  of  observing,  generalizing,  and  con- 
cluding; when  questioned,  they  can  but  rest  on  their 
own  authority,  or  appeal  to  the  future  event,  332. 

Pilate,  37,  469. 

Pindar,  22,  250. 

Pius  IV,  Pope:  290;  the  Creed  of  Pope  Pius  IV  pre- 
scribes the  general  rule  of  faith  against  the  heresies 
of  these  latter  times,  134. 

Pliny:  470,  476;  quoted,  471,  472. 

Plurality  of  Worlds,  controversy  about,  201,  383. 

Poet:  to  fail  in  clearness  of  style  is  the  most  pardon- 
able fault  of  a  poet,  21;  true  poetry  is  a  spontaneous 
outpouring  of  thought,  and  therefore  belongs  to 
rude  as  well  as  to  gifted  minds,  whereas  no  one 
becomes  a  poet  merely  by  the  canons  of  criticism, 
331. 

Poetry:  vide  Poet;  poetry  of  the  Old  Testament, — • 
vide  Jews. 

Polycarp:  quoted,  480. 


156  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

PoLYTHEisT,  —  vide  Greek. 

POMPEY,  27. 

PONTIFEX  MaXIMUS,   10. 

PONTUS,  470. 

Pope,  298. 

Pope,  The,  199. 

Portent:  a  second  portent  does  not  obliterate  a  first, 
435. 

Portugal,  304. 

PoTAMi^NA,  words  of,  483. 

"Practical  Certitude,"  325-6. 

Pr^torium,  484. 

"Pray  in  the  Holy  Ghost,  abide  in  the  love  of  God," 
etc.,  138. 

Prayer:  prayer  is  essential  to  religion,  and,  where 
prayer  is,  there  is  a  natural  relief  and  solace  in  all 
trouble,  great  or  ordinary;  it  is  not  less  general  in 
mankind  at  large  than  is  faith  in  Providence;  it  has 
ever  been  in  use,  both  as  a  personal  and  as  a  social 
practice,  403;  as  prayer  is  the  voice  of  man  to  God, 
so  Revelation  is  the  voice  of  God  to  man,  404. 

"Preach  the  kingdom  of  heaven,"  451. 

"  Preach  to  all  nations,  beginning  with  Jerusalem,"  451. 

Predestination,  —  vide  Augustine,  St. 

Predicate:  I  apprehend  a  proposition,  when  I  appre- 
hend its  predicate,  14  (vide  Proposition). 

Prejudice:  prejudice  hinders  assent  to  the  most  in- 
controvertible proofs,  169;  it  implies  strong  assents 
to  the  disadvantage  of  its  object;  that  is,  it  en- 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  157 

Prejudice:  continued. 

courages  such  assents,  and  guards  them  from  the 
chance  of  being  lost,  185;  our  first  assents,  right  or 
wrong,  are  often  little  more  than  prejudices;  the 
reasonings,  which  precede  and  accompany  them, 
though  sufficient  for  their  purpose,  do  not  rise  up 
to  the  importance  and  energy  of  the  assents  them- 
selves, 194;  prejudice  is  an  assent  previous  to  rational 
grounds,  258;  it  may  be  indefectible,  258  (vide 
Indefectibility)  . 

Presumption:  presumption  is  an  assent  to  first  prin- 
ciples, 60  (vide  Principles,  First);  it  is  a  notional 
assent,  42;  vide  Assumptions. 

Presumptive  Assent,  —  vide  Prima  Facie  Assent. 

"  Pride  will  have  a  fall,"  20. 

Priest:  32;  wherever  there  is  a  priest,  there  is  the 
notion  of  sin,  pollution,  and  retribution,  as,  on  the 
other  hand,  of  intercession  and  mediation,  392. 

Priestley,  339. 

Prima  Facie  Assent:  a  presumptive  or  prima  facie 
assent  is  an  assent"  to  an  antecedent  probability  of 
a  fact,  not  to  the  fact  itself,  181-2. 

Principia,  Newton's,  320,  340. 

Principles,  First:  first  principles  are  the  propositions 
with  which  we  start  in  reasoning  on  any  given  sub- 
ject-matter, 60;  they  are  elementary  truths  prior 
to  reasoning,  65;  without  them  there  can  be  no  con- 
clusions at  all,  237;  they  are  very  numerous,  and 
vary  in  great  measure  with  the  persons  who  reason, 


158  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Principles,  First:  contmued. 
being  received  by  some  minds,  not  by  others,  and 
only  a  few  of  them  received  universally;  they  are 
all  of  them  notions,  60;  our  trust  in  our  powers  of 
reasoning  and  memory  is  not  a  first  principle,  60-1 
(vide  Faculty);  the  proposition,  that  there  are 
things  existing  external  to  ourselves,  is  a  first  prin- 
ciple, and  one  of  universal  reception,  61  (vide  Ex- 
ternal World);  the  Ubiquitous  Presence  of  One 
Supreme  Master  is  a  first  principle,  63  (vide  Omni- 
presence); "There  is  a  right  and  a  wrong,"  "a  true 
and  a  false,"  "a  just  and  an  unjust,"  "a  beautiful 
and  a  deformed";  these  so-called  first  principles  are 
really  conclusions  or  abstractions  from  particular 
experiences,  not  elementary  truths  prior  to  reason- 
ing, 64-5;  the  belief  in  causation  is  an  assent  to  a 
first  principle,  66  (vide  Causation);  the  uniformity 
of  the  laws  of  nature  is  another  first  principle  or 
notion,  derived  by  us  from  experience,  68  (vide 
Laws  of  Nature)  ;  first  principles  are  the  recondite 
sources  of  all  knowledge,  as  to  which  logic  provides 
no  common  measure  of  minds,  —  in  which  lies  the 
whole  problem  of  attaining  to  truth,  —  and  which 
are  called  self-evident  by  their  respective  advocates 
because  they  are  evident  in  no  other  way,  269-70 
(vide  Logic);  when  there  is  any  difficulty  in  the 
investigation  of  truth,  that  difficulty  commonly  lies 
in  determining  first  principles,  not  in  the  arrange- 
ment of  proofs,  270. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  159 

Probabilities:  vide  Informal  Inference,  and  Cer- 
titude; a  cumulation  of  probabilities,  over  and 
above  their  implicit  character,  will  vary  both  in 
their  number  and  their  separate  estimated  value, 
according  to  the  particular  intellect  which  is  em- 
ployed upon  it,  293;  from  the  nature  of  the  case, 
and  from  the  constitution  of  the  human  mind,  cer- 
titude is  the  result  of  arguments  which,  taken  in  the 
letter,  and  not  in  their  full  implicit  sense,  are  but 
probabilities,  293;  vide  Proof,  and  Mind;  from 
probabilities  we  may  construct  legitimate  proof, 
sufficient  for  certitude,  411. 

Probability:  the  degrees  of  probability  are  infinite, 
175,  58  (vide  Opinion,  Assent,  and  Inference); 
vide  Certitude;  on  subjects  beyond  the  elementary 
points  of  knowledge  the  reasonings  and  conclusions 
of  mankind  vary;  and  prudent  men  in  consequence 
seldom  speak  confidently,  unless  they  are  warranted 
to  do  so  by  genius,  great  experience,  or  some  special 
qualification;  they  determine  their  judgments  by 
what  is  probable,  what  is  safe,  what  promises  best, 
what  has  verisimilitude,  what  impresses  and  sways 
them,  237;  hence  it  is  that  it  is  common  to  call 
probability  the  guide  of  life;  this  saying,  when 
properly  explained,  is  true;  however,  it  is  far  from 
true,  if  we  so  hold  it  as  to  forget  that  without  first 
principles  there  can  be  no  conclusions  at  all,  and 
that  thus  probability  does  in  some  sense  presuppose 
and  require  the  existence  of  truths  which  are  cer- 


160  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Probability:  continued. 
tain,  237,  239  (vide  Principles,  First);  a  decent 
reverence  for  the  Supreme  Being,  an  acquiescence 
in  the  claims  of  Revelation,  a  general  profession  of 
Christian  doctrine,  and  some  sort  of  attendance  on 
sacred  ordinances,  is  in  fact  all  the  religion  that  is 
usual  with  even  the  better  sort  of  men,  and  for  all 
this  a  sufficient  basis  may  certainly  be  found  in 
probabilities,  237-8  (vide  Religion);  it  is  on  no 
probability  that  we  are  constantly  receiving  the 
informations  and  dictates  of  sense  and  memory,  of 
our  intellectual  instincts,  of  the  moral  sense,  and  of 
the  logical  faculty;  it  is  on  no  probability  that  we 
receive  the  generalizations  of  science,  and  the  great 
outlines  of  history;  these  are  certain  truths,  239; 
we  have  a  direct  and  conscious  knowledge  of  our 
Maker,  His  attributes.  His  providences,  acts,  works, 
and  will,  from  nature,  and  revelation;  and,  beyond 
this  knowledge,  lies  the  large  domain  of  theology, 
metaphysics,  and  ethics,  on  which  it  is  not  allowed 
to  us  to  advance  beyond  probabilities,  or  to  attain 
to  more  than  an  opinion,  239-40. 

Probable,  —  vide  Probability. 

''Probitas  laudatur  et  alget,"  77. 

Profession:  profession  is  an  assent  so  feeble  and  su- 
perficial, as  to  be  little  more  than  an  assertion,  42 
(vide  Mere  Assertion);  it  is  a  notional  assent,  42; 
such  are  the  assents  made  upon  habit  and  without 
reflection;  such  again  are  the  assents  of  men  of 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  161 

Profession:  continued. 

wavering,  restless  minds,  who  take  up  and  then 
abandon  beliefs  so  readily,  so  suddenly,  as  to  make 
it  appear  that  they  had  no  view  on  the  matter  they 
professed,  and  did  not  know  to  what  they  assented 
or  why,  42;  when  men  say  they  have  no  doubt  of  a 
thing,  this  is  a  case,  in  which  it  is  difficult  to  deter- 
mine whether  they  assent  to  it,  infer  it,  or  consider 
it  highly  probable;  many  a  disciple  of  a  philosophical 
school,  who  talks  fluently,  does  but  assert,  when  he 
seems  to  assent  to  the  dicta  of  his  master,  43;  vide 
Formalism;  it  is  thus  that  political  and  religious 
watchwords  are  created,  43;  this  is  the  way  in  which 
men  in  general  adopt  the  "  ipse  dixit "  of  an  eminent 
scientific  authority,  44;  inference  also  may  impose 
on  us  assents  which  in  themselves  are  little  better 
than  assertions,  for  instance,  that  the  stars  are  not 
less  than  billions  of  miles  distant  from  the  earth, 
45;  belief  in  a  mystery  can  be  more  than  an  asser- 
tion, 45  (vide  Mystery). 

Professions:  various  callings  and  professions  give 
scope  to  the  exercise  of  great  talents,  which  are 
matured,  not  by  mere  rule,  but  by  personal  skill 
and  sagacity,  357. 

Progress:  man  is  a  being  of  progress  with  relation  to 
his  perfection  and  characteristic  good,  349,  233; 
vide  Man;  the  progress  of  which  man's  nature  is 
capable  is  a  development,  not  a  destruction  of  its 
original  state;  it  must  subserve  the  elements  from 


162  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Progress:  continued. 

which  it  proceeds,  in  order  to  be  a  true  development 
and  not  a  perversion,  395-6  (vide  Natural  Relig- 
ion). 

Proof:  I  may  have  a  difficulty  in  the  management  of 
a  proof,  while  I  remain  unshaken  in  my  adherence 
to  the  conclusion,  180  (vide  Assent,  and  Logic);  a 
body  of  proof,  or  a  line  of  argument,  may  produce  a 
distinct,  nay,  a  dissimilar  effect,  as  addressed  to  one 
or  to  the  other  of  two  minds,  302;  what  to  one  in- 
tellect is  a  proof  is  not  so  to  another,  293  (vide 
Probabilities);  a  proof,  except  in  abstract  demon- 
stration, has  always  in  it,  more  or  less,  an  element 
of  the  personal,  317;  the  language  in  common  use, 
when  concrete  conclusions  are  in  question,  implies 
this;  we  are  considered  to  feel,  rather  than  to  see, 
its  cogency;  and  we  decide,  not  that  the  conclusion 
must  be,  but  that  it  cannot  be  otherwise;  we  say 
that  we  do  not  see  our  way  to  doubt  it,  that  it  is 
impossible  to  doubt,  that  we  are  bound  to  believe 
it,  that  we  should  be  idiots,  if  we  did  not  believe; 
phrases  such  as  these  signify  that  we  have  arrived 
at  these  conclusions  —  not  ex  opere  operato,  by  a 
scientific  necessity  independent  of  ourselves,  —  but 
by  the  action  of  our  own  minds,  by  our  own  indi- 
vidual perception  of  the  truth  in  question,  under  a 
sense  of  duty  to  those  conclusions  and  with  an 
intellectual  conscientiousness,  317-18  (vide  Truth); 
a  proof  is  the  limit  of  converging  probabilities^  321 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  163 

Proof:  continued. 

(vide  Informal  Inference);  reason  never  bids  us 
be  certain  except  on  an  absolute  proof;  and  such  a 
proof  can  never  be  furnished  to  us  by  the  logic  of 
words,  for  as  certitude  is  of  the  mind,  so  is  the  act 
of  inference  which  leads  to  it,  345,  353  (vide  Cri- 
terion); vide  Argument,  and  Man. 

Propaganda,  462. 

Prophecy:  the  event  is  the  true  key  to  prophecy,  and 
reconciles  conflicting  and  divergent  descriptions  by 
embodying  them  in  one  common  representative, 
446  (vide  Mystery,  and  Enigal\s). 

"Prophesied  of  him  evil,"  453. 

Prophetical  Office  of  the  Church,  Newman's:  quoted,  380. 

Prophets,  139,  448,  452,  453. 

Proposition:  there  are  three  modes  of  enunciating  a 
proposition:  it  may  be  categorical,  conditional,  or 
interrogative;  the  categorical  makes  an  assertion, 
and  implies  the  absence  of  any  condition  or  reserva- 
tion; the  conditional  expresses  a  conclusion,  and 
implies  its  dependence  on  other  propositions;  the 
interrogative  asks  a  question,  and  implies  the  pos- 
sibility of  an  affirmative  or  negative  resolution  of 
it,  3;  a  proposition,  which  starts  with  being  a  ques- 
tion, may  become  a  conclusion,  and  then  be  changed 
into  an  assertion,  3-4;  an  assertion  is  as  distinct  from 
a  conclusion,  as  a  word  of  command  is  from  a  per- 
suasion or  recommendation;  command  and  asser- 
tion dispense  with,  discard,  ignore,  antecedents  of 


164  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Proposition  :  continued. 

any  kind;  they  both  carry  with  them  the  pretension 
of  being  personal  acts,  4;  these  three  modes  of  put- 
ting a  proposition  may  co-exist  as  regards  one  and 
the  same  subject,  4.  There  are  three  modes  of 
holding  a  proposition,  viz.,  assent,  inference,  and 
doubt,  corresponding  to  assertion,  conclusion,  and 
question,  5;  propositions,  while  they  are  the  ma- 
terial of  the  three  enunciations,  are  also  the  objects 
of  the  three  corresponding  mental  acts,  5;  the  three 
mental  acts  are,  with  reference  to  one  and  the  same 
proposition,  distinct  from  each  other,  5;  when  they 
are  severally  carried  out  into  the  intellectual  habits 
of  an  individual,  they  become  the  principles  and 
notes  of  three  distinct  states  or  characters  of  mind; 
for  instance,  in  the  case  of  Revealed  Religion,  ac- 
cording as  one  or  other  of  these  is  paramount  within 
him,  a  man  is  a  sceptic  as  regards  it;  or  a  philosopher, 
thinking  it  more  or  less  probable  considered  as  a 
conclusion  of  reason;  or  he  has  an  unhesitating  faith 
in  it,  and  is  recognized  as  a  believer,  6;  in  all  minds 
there  is  a  certain  co-existence  of  these  distinct  acts; 
that  is,  of  two  of  them,  for  we  can  at  once  infer  and 
assent,  though  we  cannot  at  once  either  assent  or 
infer  and  also  doubt,  6;  these  three  acts  are  all 
natural  to  the  mind,  6;  it  is  possible,  it  is  common 
in  the  particular  case,  to  err  in  the  exercise  of  them; 
but  such  errors  of  the  individual  belong  to  the  in- 
dividual, not  to  his  nature,  and  cannot  avail  to 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  165 

Proposition  :  continued. 

forfeit  for  him  his  natural  right,  under  proper  cir- 
cumstances, to  doubt,  or  to  infer,  or  to  assent,  7 
(vide  Act);  vide  Assent  and  Inference.  The 
apprehension  of  a  proposition  is  twofold,  notional 
and  real,  9-10  (vide  Apprehension,  Notional 
Apprehension,  and  Real  Apprehension);  the 
terms  of  a  proposition  sometimes  stand  for  certain 
ideas  existing  in  our  own  minds,  and  for  nothing 
outside  of  them;  sometimes  for  things  simply  ex- 
ternal to  us,  brought  home  to  us  through  the  expe- 
riences and  informations  we  have  of  them,  9;  notional 
proposition,  —  vide  Notional  Proposition;  real 
proposition,  —  vide  Real  Proposition;  assent  to  a 
notional  proposition,  —  vide  Notional  Assent; 
assent  to  a  real  proposition,  —  vide  Real  Assent; 
the  same  proposition  may  have  a  notional  sense  as 
used  by  one  man,  and  a  real  as  used  by  another, 
10,  26;  as  the  multitude  of  common  nouns  have 
originally  been  singular,  it  is  not  surprising  that 
many  of  them  should  so  remain  still  in  the  appre- 
hension of  particular  individuals,  11;  in  the  same 
mind  and  at  the  same  time,  the  same  proposition 
may  express  both  what  is  notional  and  what  is  real; 
when  a  lecturer  in  mechanics  or  chemistry  shows 
to  his  class  by  experiment  some  physical  fact,  he 
and  his  hearers  at  once  enunciate  it  as  an  individual 
thing  before  their  eyes,  and  also  as  generalized  by 
their  minds  into  a  law  of  nature,  11;  I  apprehend  a 


166  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Proposition  :  continued. 

proposition,  when  I  apprehend  its  predicate;  the 
subject  itself  need  not  be  apprehended  per  se  in 
order  to  a  genuine  assent:  for  it  is  the  very  thing 
which  the  predicate  has  to  elucidate,  14;  there  are 
three  directions,  which  among  others  the  assent 
may  take,  viz.,  assent  immediately  to  a  proposition 
itself,  assent  to  its  truth,  and  assent  both  to  its 
truth  and  to  the  ground  of  its  being  true;  in  each 
of  these  there  is  one  and  the  same  absolute  adhesion 
of  the  mind  to  the  proposition,  16  (vide  Assent); 
yet,  though  these  assents  are  all  unreserved,  still 
they  certainly  differ  in  strength,  16-17  (vide  Assent, 
Notional  and  Real);  this  illustrated  by  the  in- 
stance of  a  child  assenting  to  his  mother's  veracity; 
her  veracity  and  authority  is  to  him  no  abstract 
truth  or  item  of  general  knowledge,  but  is  bound  up 
with  that  image  and  love  of  her  person  which  is  part 
of  himself,  and  makes  a  direct  claim  on  him  for  his 
summary  assent  to  her  general  teachings,  17;  without 
a  proposition  or  thesis  there  can  be  no  assent,  no 
belief,  at  all,  119,  120-1  (vide  Religion). 

Protectionist,  85. 

Protestant:  vide  Opinion;  account  of  the  conversion 
of  three  Protestants,  one  to  Catholicism,  one  to 
Unitarianism,  and  one  to  Atheism,  245-7;  in  none 
of  these  cases  need  a  certitude  be  lost,  247;  each  of 
the  three  men  started  with  just  one  certitude,  and 
he  carried  it  out  and  carried  it  with  him  into  a  new 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  167 

Protestant:  continued. 

system  of  belief;  he  has  indeed  made  serious  addi- 
tions to  his  initial  ruling  principle,  but  he  has  lost 
no  conviction  of  which  he  was  originally  possessed, 
247;  the  conversion  of  a  Protestant  to  the  Catholic 
Church  and  back  again  to  Protestantism  need  not 
entail  a  loss  of  certitude,  247-8;  if  certain  Protestants 
were  to  take  up  the  profession  of  Islam,  it  would 
not  be  a  proof  of  the  defectibility  of  certitude,  248-9; 
the  deep  prejudice  now  existing  against  the  Church 
among  Protestants,  if  abandoned,  is  no  evidence 
that  certitude  can  fail,  254. 

Protestantism:  244,  245,  251;  the  fundamental 
dogma  of  Protestantism  is  the  exclusive  authority 
of  Holy  Scripture,  243;  vide  Protestant. 

Proverbs:  good  to  the  good,  and  evil  to  the  evil,  is 
instinctively  felt  to  be,  even  from  what  we  see,  the 
universal  rule  of  God's  dealings  with  us;  hence  come 
the  great  proverbs,  indigenous  in  both  Christian 
and  heathen  nations,  that  punishment  is  sure, 
though  slow,  that  murder  will  out,  that  treason 
never  prospers,  that  pride  will  have  a  fall,  that 
honesty  is  the  best  policy,  and  that  curses  fall  on 
the  heads  of  those  who  utter  them,  402-3. 

Providence:  56;  God's  Providence  is  nearly  the  only 
doctrine  held  with  a  real  assent  by  the  mass  of 
religious  Englishmen,  57  (vide  England,  Church 
of);  the  great  majority  of  men  recognize  the  Hand 
of  unseen  power,  directing  in  mercy  or  in  judgment 


168  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Providence:  continued. 

the  physical  and  moral  system,  402;  vide  Proverbs; 
it  is  difficult  to  trace  the  path  and  to  determine  the 
scope  of  Divine  Providence,  421  (vide  Vengeance); 
when  we  are  about  to  pass  judgment  on  the  dealings 
of  Providence  with  other  men,  we  shall  do  well  to 
consider  first  His  dealings  with  ourselves;  and  we 
know  that  He  has  ever  been  good  to  us,  and  not 
severe,  421. 

"Proximus  sum  egomet  mihi,"  61. 

Prudence  is  not  a  constituent  part  of  our  nature,  but 
a  personal  endowment,  317. 

Prudent  Men  seldom  speak  confidently  on  subjects 
which  lie  beyond  the  elementary  points  of  knowledge, 
unless  they  are  warranted  to  do  so  by  genius,  great 
experience,  or  some  special  qualification,  237  (vide 
Probability). 

Prudentius,  Hymn  of:  quoted,  477. 

Prussia,  304. 

Psalmist,  452. 

Psalms,  139. 

"PsALMUS  Quicunque^\-  the  Athanasian  Creed  has 
sometimes  been  called  the  "Psalmus  Quicunque," 
133. 

Psalter,  118. 

Psychology:  no  power  of  words  in  a  lecturer  would 
be  sufficient  to  make  psychology  easy  to  his  hearers; 
if  they  are  to  profit  by  him,  they  must  throw  their 
minds  into  the  matters  in  discussion,  must  accom- 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  169 

Psychology:  continued. 

pany  his  treatment  of  them  with  an  active,  personal 
concurrence,  and  interpret  for  themselves,  as  he 
proceeds,  the  dim  suggestions  and  adumbrations 
of  objects,  which  he  has  a  right  to  presuppose,  while 
he  uses  them,  as  images  existing  in  their  apprehen- 
sion as  well  as  in  his  own,  21. 

Punishment:  all  human  suffering  is  in  its  last  resolu- 
tion the  punishment  of  sin,  and  punishment  implies 
a  Judge  and  a  rule  of  justice,  407  (vide  Atonement). 

Pyramids,  219. 

Pyrrhonist,  311. 

Pyrrhus,  363. 

Q 

Qualified  Assent:  a  modified  or  qualified  assent  is 
an  apparent  assent,  181-2. 

"Quern  tu  Melpomene,"  296. 

Question:  propositions  take  an  interrogative  form 
when  they  ask  a  question,  3  (vide  Proposition);  a 
question  is  the  expression  of  a  doubt,  5. 

R 

"Racked,  mocked,  stoned,  cut  asunder,  they  wandered 

about,"  etc.,  453. 
Rafael,  357. 
Raleigh,  276. 
Rash  Judgment  is  an  assent  made  without  rational 

grounds,  258. 


170  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Ratiocination,  —  vide  Reasoning. 

Ratiocinative  Faculty:  vide  Natural  Inference; 
it  not  unfrequently  happens,  that  while  the  keen- 
ness of  the  ratiocinative  faculty  enables  a  man  to 
see  the  ultimate  result  of  a  complicated  problem  in 
a  moment,  it  takes  years  for  him  to  embrace  it  as  a 
truth,  and  to  recognize  it  as  an  item  in  the  circle  of 
his  knowledge,  169;  this  faculty,  as  it  is  actually 
found  in  us,  proceeds  from  concrete  to  concrete, 
338;  the  ratiocinative  faculty,  as  found  in  indi- 
viduals, is  not  a  general  instrument  of  knowledge, 
but  has  its  province,  or  is  what  may  be  called  de- 
partmental; it  is  not  so  much  one  faculty,  as  a  col- 
lection of  similar  or  analogous  faculties  under  one 
name,  there  being  really  as  many  faculties  as  there 
are  distinct  subject-matters,  though  in  the  same 
person  some  of  them  may,  if  it  so  happen,  be  united, 
339  (vide  Memory). 

Rationality:  a  man  differs  from  a  brute,  not  in 
rationality  only,  but  in  all  that  he  is,  even  in  those 
respects  in  which  he  is  most  like  a  brute,  282  (vide 
Nature)  ;  we  are  conscious  of  the  objects  of  external 
nature,  and  we  reflect  and  act  upon  them,  and  this 
consciousness,  reflection,  and  action  we  call  our 
rationality,  346  (vide  Man). 

Real  and  Notional  Assent,  —  vide  Assent,  No- 
tional AND  Real. 

Real  Apprehension:  real  apprehension  is  the  appre- 
hension of  a  real  proposition,  10,  22-3  (vide  Propo- 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  171 

Real  Apprehension:  continued. 

siTiON,  and  Real  Proposition);  it  is  in  the  first 
instance  an  experience  or  information  about  the 
concrete,  23  (vide  Apprehension,  and  Notional 
Apprehension);  real  apprehension,  as  such,  does 
not  impel  to  action,  any  more  than  notional;  but  it 
excites  and  stimulates  the  affections  and  passions,  by 
bringing  facts  home  to  them  as  motive  causes;  thus 
it  indirectly  brings  about  what  the  apprehension  of 
large  principles,  of  general  laws,  or  of  moral  obli- 
gations, never  could  effect,  12  (vide  Imagination, 
and  Affections);  real  apprehension  is  supplied, 
(1)  by  our  bodily  senses  or  our  mental  sensations 
or  indirectly  by  means  of  a  picture  or  even  a  nar- 
rative, (2)  by  the  memory,  (3)  by  means  of  the 
inventive  faculty,  23-9;  no  description,  however 
complete,  could  convey  to  my  mind  an  exact  like- 
ness of  a  tune  or  an  harmony,  which  I  have  never 
heard;  and  still  less  of  a  scent,  which  I  have  never 
smelt;  and  quite  as  difficult  is  it  to  create  or  to 
apprehend  by  description  images  of  mental  facts, 
of  which  w^e  have  no  direct  experience,  28;  as  regards 
the  affections  and  passions  of  our  nature,  they  are 
sui  generis  respectively,  and  incommensurable,  and 
must  be  severally  experienced  in  order  to  be  appre- 
hended really,  29;  notional  and  real  apprehension, 
—  vide  Apprehension,  Notional  and  Real. 

Real  Assent:  real  assent  is  an  assent  to  a  real  propo- 
sition,  214;   in   real   assents   the    mind   is   directed 


172  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Real  Assent:  continued. 

towards  things,  represented  by  the  impressions  which 
they  have  left  on  the  imagination,  75;  it  is  in  itself 
an  intellectual  act,  of  which  the  object  is  presented 
to  it  by  the  imagination,  89;  the  fact  of  the  distinct- 
ness of  the  images,  which  are  required  for  real  assent, 
is  no  warrant  for  the  existence  of  the  objects  which 
those  images  represent,  80  (vide  Image,  and  Imag- 
ination); assent,  however  strong,  and  accorded  to 
images  however  vivid,  is  not  therefore  necessarily 
practical,  82,  89  (vide  Affections);  real  assent,  as 
the  experience  which  it  presupposes,  is  proper  to 
the  individual,  and,  as  such,  thwarts  rather  than 
promotes  the  intercourse  of  man  with  man;  it  cannot 
be  reckoned  on,  anticipated,  accounted  for,  inas- 
much as  it  is  the  accident  of  this  man  or  that,  83-4 
(vide  Individual);  images  which  are  possessed  in 
common,  with  their  apprehensions  and  assents,  may 
nevertheless  be  personal  characteristics;  an  image, 
though  the  same  in  several  minds,  would  in  each 
case  be  so  idiosyncratic  in  its  circumstances,  that  it 
would  stand  by  itself,  a  special  formation,  uncon- 
nected with  any  law;  though  at  the  same  time  it 
would  necessarily  be  a  principle  of  sympathy  and  a 
bond  of  intercourse  between  those  whose  minds  had 
been  thus  variously  wrought  into  a  common  assent, 
far  stronger  than  could  follow  upon  any  multitude 
or  mere  notions  which  they  unanimously  held,  86-7; 
real  assents  are  sometimes  called  beliefs,  convictions, 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  173 

Real  Assent:  continued. 

certitudes,  87;  as  given  to  moral  objects,  they  are 
perhaps  as  rare  as  they  are  powerful,  87-8;  till  we 
have  them,  in  spite  of  a  full  apprehension  and  assent 
in  the  field  of  notions,  we  have  no  intellectual  moor- 
ings, and  are  at  the  mercy  of  impulses,  fancies,  and 
wandering  lights,  whether  as  regards  personal  con- 
duct, social  and  political  action,  or  religion;  these 
beliefs,  be  they  true  or  false  in  the  particular  case, 
form  the  mind  out  of  w^hich  they  grow,  and  impart 
to  it  a  seriousness  and  manliness  which  inspires  in 
other  minds  a  confidence  in  its  views,  and  is  one 
secret  of  persuasiveness  and  influence  in  the  public 
stage  of  the  world;  they  create,  as  the  case  may  be, 
heroes  and  saints,  great  leaders,  statesmen,  preachers, 
and  reformers,  the  pioneers  of  discovery  in  science, 
visionaries,  fanatics,  knight-errants,  demagogues, 
and  adventurers,  88  (vide  Action  of  Life);  the 
images  in  which  real  assent  lives,  representing  as 
they  do  the  concrete,  have  the  power  of  the  con- 
crete upon  the  affections  and  passions,  and  by  means 
of  these  indirectly  become  operative,  89  (vide 
Image);  belief,  being  concerned  with  things  con- 
crete, has  for  its  objects,  not  only  directly  what  is 
true,  but  inclusively  what  is  beautiful,  useful, 
admirable,  heroic;  objects  which  kindle  devotion, 
rouse  the  passions,  and  attach  the  affections;  and 
thus  it  leads  the  way  to  actions  of  every  kind,  to  the 
establishment  of  principles,  and  the  formation  of 


174  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Real  Assent:  continued. 

character,  and  is  thus  again  intimately  connected 
with  what  is  individual  and  personal,  90-1;  an 
assent  to  a  fact,  with  an  imaginative  apprehension 
of  it,  requires  a  present  experience  or  memory  of  the 
fact,  102;  it  is  assent,  pure  and  simple,  which  is  the 
motive  cause  of  great  achievements;  it  is  a  confi- 
dence, growing  out  of  instincts  rather  than  argu- 
ments, stayed  upon  a  vivid  apprehension,  and 
animated  by  a  transcendent  logic,  more  concen- 
trated in  will  and  in  deed  for  the  very  reason  that  it 
has  not  been  subjected  to  any  intellectual  develop- 
ment, 216  (vide  Certitude). 

Real  Presence:  the  dogma  of  the  Real  Presence, 
which  is  easy  to  popular  apprehension,  is  necessarily 
absent  from  all  of  the  ante-Nicene  Symbols;  but  the 
omission  is  owing  to  the  ancient  "  Disciplina  Arcani," 
which  withheld  the  Sacred  Mystery  from  catechu- 
mens and  heathen,  to  whom  the  Creed  was  known, 
145;  245,  488. 

Real  Proposition:  a  real  proposition  is  a  proposition 
which  is  composed  of  singular  nouns,  and  of  which 
the  terms  stand  for  things  external  to  us,  unit  and 
individual,  9-10  (vide  Proposition). 

Realization:  on  only  few  subjects  have  any  of  us  the 
opportunity  of  realizing  in  our  minds  what  we 
speak  and  hear  about;  and  we  fancy  that  we  are 
doing  justice  to  individual  men  and  things  by  making 
them  a  mere  synthesis  of  qualities,  as  if  any  number 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  175 

Realization:  continued. 

whatever  of  abstractions  would,  by  being  fused  to- 
gether, be  equivalent  to  one  concrete,  33  (vide 
Language). 

Reason:  the  heart  is  commonly  reached,  not  through 
the  reason,  but  through  the  imagination,  92  (vide 
Heart);  in  religion  the  imagination  and  affections 
should  always  be  under  the  control  of  reason,  121 
(vide  Sentiment);  reason  never  bids  us  be  certain 
except  on  an  absolute  proof,  345  (vide  Certitude, 
and  Proof);  reason  need  not  come  first  and  faith 
second  (though  this  is  the  logical  order),  but  one 
and  the  same  teaching  is  in  different  aspects  both 
object  and  proof,  and  elicits  one  complex  act  both 
of  inference  and  of  assent,  492  (vide  Christianity). 

Reasoning:  vide  Inference;  impressions  lead  to 
action,  and  reasonings  lead  from  it,  95  (vide  Con- 
clusion); instances  and  patterns,  not  logical  rea- 
sonings, are  the  living  conclusions  which  alone  have 
a  hold  over  the  affections  or  can  form  the  character, 
97;  errors  in  reasoning  are  lessons  and  warnings,  not 
to  give  up  reasoning,  but  to  reason  with  greater  cau- 
tion; it  is  absurd  to  break  up  the  whole  structure  of 
our  knowledge,  which  is  the  glory  of  the  human 
intellect,  because  the  intellect  is  not  infallible  in  its 
conclusions,  230  (vide  Error);  trust  in  the  faculty 
of  reasoning,  —  vide  Faculty;  we  reason,  when  we 
hold  this  by  virtue  of  that,  259;  our  reasoning  ordi- 
narily presents  itself  to  our  mind  as  a  simple  act, 


176  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OP 

Reasoning:  continued. 

not  a  process  or  series  of  acts;  we  apprehend  the 
antecedent  and  then  apprehend  the  consequent, 
without  explicit  recognition  of  the  medium  connect- 
ing the  two,  as  if  by  a  sort  of  direct  association  of 
the  first  thought  with  the  second;  we  proceed  by  a 
sort  of  instinctive  perception,  from  premiss  to  con- 
clusion; instinctive,  because  ordinarily,  or  at  least 
often,  it  acts  by  a  spontaneous  impulse,  as  prompt 
and  inevitable  as  the  exercise  of  sense  and  memory, 
259-60,  330;  nor  is  there  any  antecedent  ground  for 
determining  that  it  will  not  be  as  correct  in  its  in- 
formations as  it  is  instinctive,  as  trustworthy  as  are 
sensible  perception  and  memory,  260;  if  we  may 
justly  regard  the  universe,  according  to  the  meaning 
of  the  word,  as  one  whole,  we  may  also  believe  justly 
that  to  know  one  part  of  it  is  necessarily  to  know 
much  more  than  that  one  part;  but  if  this  summa 
rerum  is  thus  one  whole,  it  must  be  constructed  on 
definite  principles  and  laws,  the  knowledge  of  which 
will  enlarge  our  capacity  of  reasoning  about  it  in 
particulars ;  —  thus  we  are  led  on  to  aim  at  deter- 
mining, on  a  large  scale  and  on  system,  what  even 
gifted  or  practised  intellects  are  only  able  by  their 
own  personal  vigour  to  reach  piecemeal  and  fitfully, 
that  is,  at  substituting  scientific  methods,  such  as 
all  may  use,  for  the  action  of  individual  genius, 
260-1;  it  becomes  a  necessity,  if  it  be  possible,  to 
analyze  the  process  of  reasoning,  and  to  invent  a 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  177 

Reasoning  :  continued. 

method  which  may  act  as  a  common  measure  be- 
tween mind  and  mind,  as  a  means  of  joint  investiga- 
tion, and  as  a  recognized  intellectual  standard,  — 
a  standard  such  as  to  secure  us  against  hopeless 
mistakes,  and  to  emancipate  us  from  the  capricious 
ipse  dixit  of  authority,  262;  one  such  method  is 
geometry;  another  is  algebra;  a  more  ambitious 
because  a  more  comprehensive  contrivance  still, 
for  interpreting  the  concrete  world  is  the  method 
of  logical  inference,  262;  ratiocination,  restricted 
and  put  into  grooves,  is  what  Newman  calls  infer- 
ence, and  the  science,  which  is  its  regulating  prin- 
ciple, is  logic,  263  (vide  Formal  Inference);  in 
concrete  reasonings  we  judge  for  ourselves,  by  our 
own  lights,  and  on  our  own  principles,  302  (vide 
Criterion,  Truth,  and  Informal  Inference)  ;  our 
most  natural  mode  of  reasoning  is,  not  from  proposi- 
tions to  propositions,  but  from  things  to  things, 
from  concrete  to  concrete,  from  wholes  to  w^holes; 
whether  the  consequents,  at  which  we  arrive  from 
the  antecedents  with  which  we  start,  lead  us  to 
assent  or  only  towards  assent,  those  antecedents 
commonly  are  not  recognized  by  us  as  subjects  for 
analysis;  nay,  often  are  only  indirectly  recognized 
as  antecedents  at  all,  330-1  (vide  Natural  Infer- 
ence); vide  Illative  Sense. 

Re-Consideration  of  a  question  which  has  already 
been  definitely  determined  need  not  abruptly  un- 


178  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Re-Consideration  :  continued. 

settle  the  existing  certitude  of  those  who  engage  in 
it,  or  throw  them  into  a  scepticism  about  things  in 
general,  even  though  eventually  they  find  they  have 
been  wrong  in  a  particular  matter,  230  (vide  Cer- 
titude). 

Reflex  Assent:  a  reflex  assent  is  an  assent  which 
must  be  made  consciously  and  deliberately,  189;  it 
is  an  assent  to  an  assent,  195  (vide  Conviction); 
reflex  assent  of  certitude,  —  vide  Certitude. 

Reflexion:  the  mind  is  like  a  double  mirror,  in  which 
reflexions  of  self  within  self  multiply  themselves  till 
they  are  undistinguishable,  and  the  first  reflexion 
contains  all  the  rest,  195,  255. 

Reformation,  245. 

Reformers,  —  vide  Action  of  Life. 

Religion:  Religion  is  the  knowledge  of  God,  of  His 
Will,  and  of  our  duties  towards  Him,  389;  Catholic 
Religion,  —  vide  Church;  Natural  Religion,  —  vide 
Natural  Religion;  Revealed  Religion,  —  vide  Re- 
vealed Religion,  and  Christianity;  religion,  as 
being  personal,  should  be  real;  such  it  is  with  Cath- 
olic populations,  and  with  quasi-Catholic  as  those 
of  Russia,  and  with  the  members  of  old  Calvinism 
and  of  Evangelical  Religion,  55-6;  but,  except 
within  a  small  range  of  subjects,  it  commonly  is  not 
real  in  England,  55  (vide  England,  Church  of);  no 
one  will  die  for  his  own  calculations:  he  dies  for 
realities;  this  is  why  a  literary  religion  is  so  little  to 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  179 

Religion:  continued. 

be  depended  upon;  it  looks  well  in  fair  weather;  but 
its  doctrines  are  opinions,  and,  when  called  to  suffer 
for  them,  it  slips  them  between  its  folios,  or  burns 
them  at  its  hearth,  93;  life  is  not  long  enough  for  a 
religion  of  inferences;  we  shall  never  have  done  be- 
ginning, if  we  determine  to  begin  with  proof,  94-5; 
if  we  commence  with  scientific  knowledge  and  argu- 
mentative proof,  or  lay  any  great  stress  upon  it  as 
the  basis  of  personal  Christianity,  or  attempt  to 
make  man  moral  and  religious  by  libraries  and 
museums,  let  us  in  consistency  take  chemists  for 
our  cooks,  and  mineralogists  for  our  masons,  95-6; 
no  religion  yet  has  been  a  religion  of  physics  or  of 
philosophy;  it  has  ever  been  synonymous  with 
revelation;  it  never  has  been  a  deduction  from  what 
we  know;  it  has  ever  been  an  assertion  of  what  we 
are  to  believe;  it  has  never  lived  in  a  conclusion;  it 
has  ever  been  a  message,  a  history,  or  a  vision,  96 
(vide  Knowledge,  and  Science);  the  firmest  hold 
of  theological  truths  is  gained  by  habits  of  personal 
religion,  117;  to  give  us  a  clear  and  sufficient  object 
for  our  faith,  is  one  main  purpose  of  the  supernatural 
Dispensations  of  Religion,  118;  there  is  no  contra- 
riety or  antagonism  between  a  dogmatic  creed  and 
vital  religion,  120;  propositions  may  and  must  be 
used,  and  can  easily  be  used,  as  the  expression  of 
facts;  again,  they  are  useful  in  their  dogmatic  aspect 
as  ascertaining  and  making  clear  for  us  the  truths. 


180  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Religion:  continued. 

on  which  the  religious  imagination  has  to  rest ;  knowl- 
edge must  ever  precede  the  exercise  of  the  affections ; 
devotion  must  have  its  objects;  those  objects,  as 
being  supernatural,  when  not  represented  to  our 
senses  by  material  symbols,  must  be  set  before  the 
mind  in  propositions;  the  formula,  which  embodies 
a  dogma  for  the  theologian,  readily  suggests  an 
object  for  the  worshipper,  120-1  (vide  Devotion, 
and  Reason);  theology  may  stand  as  a  substantive 
science,  though  it  be  without  the  life  of  religion;  but 
religion  cannot  maintain  its  ground  at  all  without 
theology,  121  (vide  Dogmatic  Theology);  religion 
demands  more  than  an  assent  to  its  truth;  it  re- 
quires a  certitude,  or  at  least  an  assent  which  is 
convertible  into  certitude  on  demand;  without  cer- 
titude in  religious  faith  there  may  be  much  decency 
of  profession  and  of  observance,  but  there  can  be 
no  habit  of  prayer,  no  directness  of  devotion,  no 
intercourse  with  the  unseen,  no  generosity  of  self- 
sacrifice,  220,  238  (vide  Probability,  Certitude, 
and  Material  Certitude);  to  accept  a  religion 
is  neither  a  simple  assent  to  it  nor  a  complex, 
243  (vide  Indefectibility)  ;  a  change  of  religion 
does  not  imply  a  change  of  conviction  or  a  failure 
of  certitude,  243-55;  vide  Church;  the  great  funda- 
mental truths  of  religion  may  be  proved  and  de- 
fended by  an  array  of  invincible  logical  arguments, 
but  such  is  not  commonly  the  method  in  which  these 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  181 

Religion:  continued. 

same  logical  arguments  make  their  way  into  our 
minds;  the  attempts  to  argue,  on  the  part  of  an 
individual  hie  et  nunc,  will  sometimes  only  confuse 
his  apprehension  of  sacred  objects,  and  subtracts 
from  his  devotion  quite  as  much  as  it  adds  to  his 
knowledge,  336  (vide  Natural  Inference);  vide 
Religious;  Evidences  of  Religion,  —  vide  Paley, 
and  Egotism;  vide  Natural  Religion,  and  Con- 
science; by  the  dictate  of  nature  we  are  not  justi- 
fied, in  the  case  of  concrete  reasoning  and  especially 
of  religious  inquiry,  in  waiting  till  logical  demon- 
stration is  ours,  412  (vide  Truth);  no  religion  is 
from  God  which  contradicts  our  sense  of  right  and 
wrong,  419;  vide  Revealed  Religion,  and  Chris- 
tianity. 

Religious:  not  even  are  idolaters  and  heathen  out  of 
the  range  of  some  religious  truths  and  their  cor- 
relative certitudes,  250  (vide  Greek);  why  men 
differ  so  widely  from  each  other  in  religious  and 
moral  perceptions,  —  vide  Statement  of  the  Case; 
as  regards  religious  and  ethical  inquiries  we  can 
effect  little,  however  much  we  exert  ourselves,  with- 
out the  Blessing  of  God;  for,  as  if  on  set  purpose, 
He  has  made  this  path  of  thought  rugged  and  cir- 
cuitous above  other  investigations,  that  the  very 
discipline  inflicted  on  our  minds  in  finding  Him 
may  mould  them  into  due  devotion  to  Him  when 
He  is  found;  certainly  we  need  a  clue  into  the  laby- 


182  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Religious:  continued. 

rinth  which  is  to  lead  us  to  Him;  and  who  among 
us  can  hope  to  seize  upon  the  true  starting-points 
of  thought  for  that  enterprise,  and  upon  all  of  them, 
who  is  to  understand  their  right  direction,  to  follow 
them  out  to  their  just  limits,  and  duly  to  estimate, 
adjust,  and  combine  the  various  reasonings  in  which 
they  issue,  so  as  safely  to  arrive  at  what  it  is  worth 
any  labour  to  secure,  without  a  special  illumination 
from  Himself?  352  (vide  Truth). 

'^  Remember  our  Creator  in  the  days  of  our  youth," 
123. 

Representations  of  any  kind  are  in  their  own  nature 
pleasurable,  whether  they  be  true  or  not,  whether 
they  come  to  us,  or  do  not  come,  as  true,  205. 

"Resist  not  evil,"  452. 

''Retro  Satana,"  199. 

Revealed  Religion:  the  fact  of  revelation  is  in  itself 
demonstrably  true,  but  it  is  not  therefore  true 
irresistibly;  else,  how  comes  it  to  be  resisted?  light 
is  a  quality  of  matter,  as  truth  is  of  Christianity; 
but  light  is  not  recognized  by  the  blind,  and  there 
are  those  who  do  not  recognize  truth,  from  the  fault, 
not  of  truth,  but  of  themselves,  410;  the  argument 
Newman  adopts  to  prove  Christianity  is  that  of  an 
accumulation  of  various  probabilities,  411  (vide 
Probabilities,  and  Concrete)  ;  the  providence  and 
intention  of  God  enters  into  his  reasoning,  412; 
instead   of  saying   that   the  truths   of   Revelation 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  183 

Revealed  Religion:  continued. 

depend  on  those  of  Natural  Religion,  it  is  more 
pertinent  to  say  that  belief  in  revealed  truths  de- 
pends on  belief  in  natural;  belief  is  a  state  of  mind; 
belief  generates  belief;  states  of  mind  correspond 
to  each  other;  the  habits  of  thought  and  the  reason- 
ings which  lead  us  on  to  a  higher  state  of  belief  than 
our  present  are  the  very  same  which  we  already 
possess  in  connexion  with  the  lower  state,  413;  one 
of  the  most  important  effects  of  Natural  Religion 
on  the  mind,  in  preparation  for  Revealed,  is  the 
anticipation  which  it  creates,  that  a  Revelation  will 
be  given;  that  earnest  desire  of  it,  which  religious 
minds  cherish,  leads  the  way  to  the  expectation  of 
it,  422-3;  when  our  attention  is  roused,  then  the 
more  steadily  we  dwell  upon  it,  the  more  probable 
does  it  seem  that  a  revelation  has  been  or  will  be 
given  to  us;  this  presentiment  is  founded  on  our 
sense,  on  the  one  hand,  of  the  infinite  goodness  of 
God,  and,  on  the  other,  of  our  own  extreme  misery 
and  need  (vide  Natural  Religion);  it  is  difficult 
to  put  a  limit  to  the  legitimate  force  of  this  ante- 
cedent probability;  some  minds  will  feel  it  to  be  so 
powerful  as  to  recognize  in  it  almost  a  proof,  with- 
out direct  evidence,  of  the  divinity  of  a  religion 
claiming  to  be  the  true,  supposing  its  history  and 
doctrine  are  free  from  positive  objection,  and  there 
be  no  rival  religion  with  plausible  claims  of  its  own, 
423;  vide  Christianity,  and  Revelation. 


184  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

"Revelatio  revelata,"  387. 

Revelation:  vide  Religion,  and  Revealed  Relig- 
ion; Butler  quoted  on  the  proof  of  Revelation, 
319-20;  an  argument  has  been  often  put  forward 
by  unbelievers,  I  think  by  Paine,  to  this  effect,  that 
"  a  revelation,  which  is  to  be  received  as  true,  ought 
to  be  written  on  the  sun";  Catholic  populations 
would  not  be  averse,  mutatis  mutandis,  to  admitting 
this;  till  these  last  centuries,  the  Visible  Church  was, 
at  least  to  her  children,  the  light  of  the  world,  as 
conspicuous  as  the  sun  in  the  heavens;  and  the 
Creed  was  written  on  her  forehead,  and  proclaimed 
through  her  voice,  by  a  teaching  as  precise  as  it  was 
emphatical;  the  Church  does  not  fail  in  this  mani- 
festation of  the  truth  now,  any  more  than  in  former 
times,  though  the  clouds  have  come  over  the  sun; 
for  what  she  has  lost  in  her  appeal  to  the  imagina- 
tion, she  has  gained  in  philosophical  cogency,  by 
the  evidence  of  her  persistent  vitality;  so  far  is 
clear,  that  if  Paine's  aphorism  has  a  prima  facie 
force  against  Christianity,  it  owes  this  advantage 
to  the  miserable  deeds  of  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth 
centuries,  378;  the  Gospel  Revelation  carries  with 
it  the  evidence  of  its  divinity,  386;  a  revelation 
might  have  been  really  given,  yet  without  creden- 
tials; thus  portions  of  revealed  truth  overflow  and 
penetrate  into  heathen  countries,  without  their 
populations  knowing  whence  those  truths  came, 
386;  but  the  very  idea  of  Christianity  in  its  profes- 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  185 

Revelation  :  continued. 

sion  and  history  is  a  "Revelatio  revelata";  it  is  a 
definite  message  from  God  to  man  distinctly  con- 
veyed by  His  chosen  instruments,  and  to  be  received 
as  such  a  message;  and  therefore  to  be  positively 
acknowledged,  embraced,  and  maintained  as  true, 
on  the  ground  of  its  being  divine,  not  as  true  on 
intrinsic  grounds,  not  as  probably  true,  or  partially 
true,  but  as  absolutely  certain  knowledge,  certain 
in  a  sense  in  which  nothing  else  can  be  certain, 
because  it  comes  from  Him  who  neither  can  deceive 
nor  be  deceived,  386-7;  the  matter  of  revelation  is 
not  a  mere  collection  of  truths,  not  a  philosophical 
view,  not  a  religious  sentiment  or  spirit,  not  a  special 
morality;  but  an  authoritative  teaching,  which 
bears  witness  to  itself  and  keeps  itself  together  as 
one,  in  contrast  to  the  assemblage  of  opinions  on  all 
sides  of  it,  and  speaks  to  all  men,  as  being  ever  and 
everywhere  one  and  the  same,  and  claiming  to  be 
received  intelligently,  by  all  whom  it  addresses,  as 
one  doctrine,  discipline,  and  devotion  directly  given 
from  above,  387;  vide  Christianity;  Christianity 
is  a  religion  in  addition  to  the  religion  of  nature; 
and  as  nature  has  an  intrinsic  claim  upon  us  to  be 
obeyed  and  used,  so  what  is  over  and  above  nature, 
or  supernatural,  must  also  bring  with  it  valid  tes- 
timonials of  its  right  to  demand  our  homage,  387-8; 
Christianity  does  not  supersede  or  contradict  nature; 
it  recognizes  and  depends  on  it,  and  that  of  neces- 


186  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Revelation:  continued. 

sity;  for  it  cannot  possibly  prove  its  claims  except 
by  an  appeal  to  what  men  have  already,  388;  as 
prayer  is  the  voice  of  man  to  God,  so  Revelation  is 
the  voice  of  God  to  man,  404;  the  expectation  of  a 
revelation  may  truly  be  considered  an  integral  part 
of  Natural  Religion,  404-5,  422-3  (vide  Natural 
Religion);  all  professed  revelations  have  been 
attended,  in  one  shape  or  another,  with  the  pro- 
fession of  miracles,  427;  the  circumstances  under 
which  a  professed  revelation  comes  to  us  may  be 
such  as  to  impress  both  our  reason  and  our  imagina- 
tion with  a  sense  of  its  truth,  even  though  no  appeal 
be  made  to  strictly  miraculous  intervention,  429; 
the  central  doctrine  of  Revelation  is  the  Mediation 
of  Christ,  487;  philosophical  discoveries  cannot 
really  contradict  divine  revelation,  258;  in  our 
intercourse  with  others,  in  business  and  family 
matters,  in  social  and  political  transactions,  a  word 
or  an  act  on  the  part  of  another  is  sometimes  a 
sudden  revelation;  light  breaks  in  upon  us,  and  our 
whole  judgment  of  a  course  of  events,  or  of  an  under- 
taking, is  changed,  338  (vide  Natural  Inference). 

"  Revolving  swans  proclaim  the  welkin  near,"  46. 

Right  and  Wrong,  —  vide  Principles,  First. 

Risk:  to  incur  a  risk  is  not  to  expect  reverse,  193  (vide 
Belief). 

"Robin  Gray,"  28. 

Roman:   vide   Greek;   478,   485,   486;   the   Romans 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  187 

Roman:  continued. 

legislated  upon  the  basis  that  each  nation  had  its 
own  gods,  450. 

Romanism,  245. 

RoMANUS,  St.,  477. 

Rome:  363,  469,  478;  Rome  is  the  home  of  political 
and  practical  wisdom,  432. 

Rule  of  Faith:  there  is  a  great  conflict  of  first  prin- 
ciples among  Christians  about  the  Rule  of  Faith; 
that  Scripture  is  the  Rule  of  Faith  is  an  assumption 
so  congenial  to  the  state  of  mind  and  course  of 
thought  usual  among  Protestants,  that  it  seems  to 
them  rather  a  truism  than  a  truth;  yet  it  is  by  no 
means  self-evident  that  all  religious  truth  is  to  be 
found  in  a  number  of  works,  however  sacred,  which 
were  written  at  different  times,  and  did  not  always 
form  one  book,  379-80;  Newman's  defence  of  the 
Protestant  view,  wTitten  while  he  was  a  Protestant, 
380. 

Ruler,  Supreme,  104  (vide  Conscience). 

Russia:  428;  assent  to  religious  objects  is  real  among 
the  quasi-Catholic  population  of  Russia,  55. 

s 

Sabine  Hills,  78. 

Sacrifice:  among  the  observances  imposed  by  the 
professed  revelations,  none  is  more  remarkable,  or 
more  general,  than  the  rite  of  sacrifice,  in  which 
guilt  was  removed  or  blessing  gained  by  an  offering. 


188  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Sacrifice:  continued. 

which  availed  instead  of  the  merits  of  the  offerer;  it 
falls  under  the  doctrine  of  atonement,  405  (vide 
Atonement);  in  all  sacrifices  it  was  specially  re- 
quired that  the  thing  offered  should  be  something 
rare,  and  unblemished,  407. 

Sages,  Eastern,  450. 

Saints:  even  Saints  may  suffer  from  imaginations  in 
which  they  have  no  part,  217-18;  the  promised 
Deliverer  has  given  us  Saints  and  Angels  for  our 
protection,  489. 

Samaritan  Version,  442  note. 

Samaritans,  386. 

Sanctus,  482. 

Saul,  337. 

Sc^voLA,  478. 

ScAViNi:  quoted,  187  note. 

Scent,  —  vide  Sight;  memory  of  scents,  —  vide 
Memory. 

Sceptic:  6,  32;  Pascal  quoted  on  the  self-satisfied 
sceptic  and  on  the  scepticism  of  Montaigne,  310-11. 

Scepticism:  resolve  to  believe  nothing,  and  you  must 
prove  your  proofs  and  analyze  your  elements,  sink- 
ing farther  and  farther,  and  finding  "in  the  lowest 
depth  a  lower  deep,"  till  you  come  to  the  broad 
bosom  of  scepticism;  I  would  rather  be  bound  to 
defend  the  reasonableness  of  assuming  that  Chris- 
tianity is  true,  than  to  demonstrate  a  moral  govern- 
ance from  the  physical  world,  95;  a  reconsideration 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  189 

Scepticism:  continued. 

of  a  question  which  has  already  been  definitely 
determined  need  not  abruptly  unsettle  the  existing 
certitude  of  those  who  engage  in  it,  or  throw  them 
into  a  scepticism  about  things  in  general,  even 
though  eventually  they  find  they  have  been  wrong 
in  a  particular  matter;  it  would  have  been  absurd 
to  prohibit  the  controversy  which  has  lately  been 
held  concerning  the  obligations  of  Newton  to  Pascal; 
and  supposing  it  had  issued  in  their  being  estab- 
lished, the  partisans  of  Newton  would  not  have 
thought  it  necessary  to  renounce  their  certitude  of 
the  law  of  gravitation  itself,  on  the  ground  that 
they  had  been  mistaken  in  their  certitude  that 
Newton  discovered  it,  230   (vide  Certitude). 

Science:  science  gives  us  the  grounds  or  premisses 
from  which  religious  truths  are  to  be  inferred;  but 
it  does  not  set  about  inferring  them,  much  less  does 
it  reach  the  inference  —  that  is  not  its  province;  it 
brings  before  us  phenomena,  and  it  leaves  us,  if  we 
will,  to  call  them  works  of  design,  wisdom,  or  benev- 
olence; and  further  still,  if  we  will,  to  proceed  to 
confess  an  Intelligent  Creator;  we  have  to  take  its 
facts,  and  to  give  them  a  meaning,  and  to  draw  our 
own  conclusions  from  them;  first  comes  knowledge, 
then  a  view,  then  reasoning,  and  then  belief;  this  is 
why  science  has  so  little  of  a  religious  tendency; 
deductions  have  no  power  of  persuasion,  92  (vide 
Religion);  science,  working  by  itself,  reaches  truth 


190  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Science:  continued. 

in  the  abstract,  and  probability  in  the  concrete^  279 
(vide  Formal  Inference)  ;  science  in  all  its  depart- 
ments has  too  much  simplicity  and  exactness,  from 
the  nature  of  the  case,  to  be  the  measure  of  fact;  in 
its  very  perfection  lies  its  incompetency  to  settle 
particulars  and  details,  284  (vide  Mind);  I  am  sus- 
picious of  scientific  demonstrations  in  a  question 
of  concrete  fact,  in  a  discussion  between  fallible 
men,  410-11  (vide  Christianity);  sciences  are  only 
so  many  distinct  aspects  of  nature;  sometimes  sug- 
gested by  nature  itself,  sometimes  created  by  the 
mind,  372. 

Scots,  33. 

Scott,  Sir  Walter:  27;  quoted,  335. 

Scott,  Thomas,  56. 

Scripture:  the  mere  knowledge  of  Scripture,  at  least 
in  England,  has  to  a  certain  point  made  up  for  great 
and  grievous  losses  in  its  Christianity;  the  reitera- 
tion again  and  again,  in  fixed  course  in  the  public  ser- 
vice, of  the  words  of  inspired  teachers  under  both 
Covenants,  and  that  in  grave  majestic  English,  has 
in  matter  of  fact  been  to  our  people  a  vast  benefit; 
it  has  attuned  their  minds  to  religious  thoughts;  it 
has  given  them  a  high  moral  standard ;  it  has  served 
them  in  associating  religion  with  compositions 
which,  even  humanly  considered,  are  among  the 
most  sublime  and  beautiful  ever  written;  especially, 
it  has  impressed  upon  them  the  series  of  Divine 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  191 

Scripture:  continued. 

Providences  in  behalf  of  man  from  his  creation  to 
his  end,  and,  above  all,  the  words,  deeds,  and  sacred 
sufferings  of  Him  in  whom  all  the  Providences  of 
God  centre,  56-7  (vide  England,  Church  of)  ;  what 
Scripture  especially  illustrates,  from  its  first  page 
to  its  last,  is  God's  Providence;  and  that  is  nearly 
the  only  doctrine  held  with  a  real  assent  by  the 
mass  of  religious  Englishmen,  57;  to  the  devout  and 
spiritual,  the  Divine  Word  speaks  of  things,  not 
merely  of  notions;  to  the  disconsolate,  the  tempted, 
the  perplexed,  the  suffering,  there  comes,  by  means 
of  their  very  trials,  an  enlargement  of  thought, 
which  enables  them  to  see  in  it  what  they  never  saw 
before;  henceforth  there  is  to  them  a  reality  in  its 
teachings,  which  they  recognize  as  an  argument, 
and  the  best  of  arguments,  for  its  divine  origin,  79; 
the  purpose  of  meditation  is  to  realize  the  Gospels; 
to  make  the  facts  which  they  relate  stand  out  before 
our  minds  as  objects,  such  as  may  be  appropriated 
by  a  faith  as  living  as  the  imagination  which  appre- 
hends them,  79;  as  regards  the  mere  popular  preacher, 
his  very  mode  of  reading,  whether  warnings  or  pray- 
ers, is  as  if  he  thought  the  more  solemn  parts  of  the 
sacred  volume  to  be  little  more  than  fine  writing, 
poetical  in  sense,  musical  in  sound,  and  worthy  of 
inspiration;  the  most  awful  truths  are  to  him  but 
sublime  or  beautiful  conceptions,  and  are  adduced 
and  used  by  him,  in  season  and  out  of  season,  for 


192  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Scripture:  continued. 

his  own  purposes,  for  embellishing  his  style  or  round- 
ing his  periods;  but  let  his  heart  at  length  be  ploughed 
by  some  keen  grief  or  deep  anxiety,  and  Scripture 
is  a  new  book  to  him,  79-80;  witness  the  confession 
of  the  patriarch  Job,  when  he  contrasts  his  appre- 
hension of  the  Almighty  before  and  after  his  afflic- 
tions, 80;  the  sacred  book  is  addressed  far  more  to 
the  imagination  and  affections  than  to  the  intellect, 
132;  Scripture  as  the  Rule  of  Faith,  —  vide  Rule 
OF  Faith;  the  fundamental  dogma  of  Protestantism 
is  the  exclusive  authority  of  Holy  Scripture,  243; 
200,  244,  245,  246. 

Search:  the  pleasure  of  a  search,  like  that  of  a  hunt, 
lies  in  the  searching,  and  ends  at  the  point  at  which 
the  pleasure  of  certitude  begins,  207. 

''See  His  day,  and  are  glad,"  464. 

"Seeing  is  believing,"  12. 

Self:  trust  in  self,  —  vide  Faculty;  what  is  more  rare 
than  self-knowledge?  188;  as  we  use  the  (so-called) 
elements  without  first  criticizing  what  we  have  no 
command  over,  so  is  it  much  more  unmeaning  in  us 
to  criticize  or  find  fault  with  our  own  nature,  which 
is  nothing  else  than  we  ourselves,  instead  of  using 
it  according  to  the  use  of  which  it  ordinarily  admits; 
our  being,  with  its  faculties,  mind  and  body,  is  a 
fact  not  admitting  of  question,  all  things  being  of 
necessity  referred  to  it,  not  it  to  other  things;  if  I 
may  not  assume  that  I  exist,  and  in  a  particular 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  193 

Self:  continued. 
way,  that  is,  with  a  particular  mental  constitution, 
I  have  nothing  to  speculate  about,  and  had  better 
let  speculation  alone;  there  is  no  medium  between 
using  my  faculties,  as  I  have  them,  and  flinging 
myself  upon  the  external  world  according  to  the 
random  impulse  of  the  moment,  as  spray  upon  the 
surface  of  the  waves,  and  simply  forgetting  that  I 
am;  I  cannot  think,  reflect,  or  judge  about  my 
being,  without  starting  from  the  very  point  which 
I  aim  at  concluding;  my  ideas  are  all  assumptions, 
and  I  am  ever  moving  in  a  circle;  my  only  business 
is  to  ascertain  what  I  am,  in  order  to  put  it  to  use 
(vide  Function);  what  I  have  to  ascertain  is  the 
laws  under  which  I  live;  my  first  elementary  lesson 
of  duty  is  that  of  resignation  to  the  laws  of  my 
nature,  whatever  they  are;  my  first  disobedience  is 
to  be  impatient  at  what  I  am,  and  to  indulge  an 
ambitious  aspiration  after  what  I  cannot  be,  to 
cherish  a  distrust  of  my  powers,  and  to  desire  to 
change  laws  which  are  identical  with  myself,  346-7 
(vide  Being,  and  Man). 

Self-Made:  it  is  man's  gift  to  be  the  creator  of  his 
own  sufficiency;  and  to  be  emphatically  self-made, 
349  (vide  Man). 

Sempronius,  32. 

Sense:  when  we  speak  of  our  having  a  picture  of  the 
things  which  are  perceived  through  the  senses,  we 
mean  a  certain  representation,  true  as  far  as  it  goes, 


194  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Sense:  continued. 
but  not  adequate,  103  (vide  Phenomena,  and  Sub- 
stance); our  senses  at  times  deceive  us,  and  have 
to  be  corrected  by  each  other,  261;  an  object  of 
sense  presents  itself  to  our  view  as  one  whole,  and 
not  in  its  separate  details:  we  take  it  in,  recognize 
it,  and  discriminate  it  from  other  objects,  all  at 
once,  301;  it  is  on  no  probability  that  we  are  con- 
stantly receiving  the  informations  and  dictates  of 
sense  and  memory,  of  our  intellectual  instincts,  of 
the  moral  sense,  and  of  the  logical  faculty,  239;  we 
are  each  of  us  ever  gaining  through  our  senses  va- 
rious certainties,  which  no  one  shares  with  us,  242; 
vide  Statement  op  the  Case. 

Sense  of  Certitude  is  the  clear  witness  to  what  is 
true,  233. 

Sentiment,  whether  imaginative  or  emotional,  falls 
back  upon  the  intellect  for  its  stay,  when  sense 
cannot  be  called  into  exercise,  121. 

Septuagint,  442  note. 

Sermon  on  the  Mount,  448,  455. 

Shakespeare,  15,  33,  271,  273,  274,  275,  276,  298,  494. 

Sheridan,  276. 

Shiloh,  442  note. 

Sibyl,  296. 

Sight:  memory  of  sights,  —  vide  Memory;  sights 
sway  us  as  scents  do  not;  our  sense  of  seeing  is  able 
to  open  to  its  object,  as  our  sense  of  smell  cannot 
open  to  its  own;  its  objects  are  able  to  awaken  the 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  195 

Sight:  continued. 

mind,  take  possession  of  it,  inspire  it,  act  through 
it,  with  an  energy  and  variousness  which  is  not  found 
in  the  case  of  scents  and  their  apprehension,  36-7; 
all  men,  as  time  goes  on,  have  the  prospect  of  losing 
that  keenness  of  sight  and  hearing  which  they  pos- 
sessed in  their  youth,  123. 

Simon  Magus,  462. 

Simple  Assent:  simple  assent  is  that  mode  of  assent 
which  is  exercised  unconsciously,  189  (vide  Assent); 
it  is  material,  or  interpretative,  or  virtual  certitude, 
211-12. 

Sin:  in  his  proof  of  Christianity,  Newman  assumes  the 
presence  of  God  in  our  conscience,  and  the  universal 
experience,  as  keen  as  our  experience  of  bodily  pain, 
of  what  we  call  a  sense  of  sin  or  guilt;  this  sense  of 
sin,  as  of  something  not  only  evil  in  itself,  but  an 
affront  to  the  good  God,  is  chiefly  felt  as  regards 
one  or  other  of  three  violations  of  His  law;  He  Him- 
self is  Sanctity,  Truth,  and  Love;  and  the  three 
offences  against  His  Majesty  are  impurity,  inve- 
racity, and  cruelty;  all  men  are  not  distressed  at 
these  offences  alike;  but  the  piercing  pain  and  sharp 
remorse  which  one  or  other  inflicts  upon  the  mind, 
till  haljituated  to  them,  brings  home  to  it  the  no- 
tion of  what  sin  is,  and  is  the  vivid  type  and  repre- 
sentative of  its  intrinsic  hatefulness,  417  (vide 
Natural  Religion). 

"Sinners  of  the  Gentiles,"  446. 


196  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

SiRius,  72. 

Sisyphus,  208. 

SixTus,  Bishop  of  Rome,  483. 

Skill,  —  vide  Taste. 

Slave-Trade:  the  iniquity  of  the  slave-trade  ought 
to  have  been  acknowledged  by  all  men  from  the 
first;  it  was  acknowledged  by  many,  but  it  needed 
an  organized  agitation,  with  tracts  and  speeches 
innumerable,  so  to  affect  the  imagination  of  men  as 
to  make  their  acknowledgment  of  that  iniquitous- 
ness  operative,  77. 

Smyrna,  480,  481. 

"So  may  all  Thy  enemies  perish,'^  etc.,  485. 

"So  persecuted  they  the  Prophets  that  were  before 
you,'^  453. 

socinianism,  245. 

Socrates,  250. 

Solomon,  376. 

Son  of  God,  449  (vide  Christianity). 

Son  of  Man,  449  (vide  Christianity),  485. 

Sound,  memory  of,  —  vide  Memory. 

South  Seas,  393. 

Space:  "Space  is  not  infinite,  for  nothing  but  the 
Creator  is  such":  —  starting  from  this  thesis  as  a 
theological  information  to  be  assumed  as  a  fact, 
though  not  one  of  experience,  we  arrive  at  once  at 
an  insoluble  mystery;  for  if  space  be  not  infinite,  it 
is  finite,  and  finite  space  is  a  contradiction  in  notions, 
space,  as  such,  implying  the  absence  of  boundaries; 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  197 

Space:  continued. 

here  it  is  our  notion  that  carries  us  beyond  the  fact, 
and  in  opposition  to  it,  showing  that  from  the  first 
what  we  apprehend  of  space  does  not  in  all  respects 
correspond  to  the  thing,  of  which  indeed  we  have 
no  image,  51-2. 

Spain:  304;  among  the  population  of  the  Spain  of  this 
day  assent  to  religious  objects  is  real,  not  notional,  55. 

Speculation:  speculation  is  commonly  taken  to  mean 
a  conjecture,  or  a  venture  on  chances ;  but  its  proper 
meaning  is  mental  sight,  or  the  contemplation  of 
mental  operations  and  their  results  as  opposed  to 
experience,  experiment,  or  sense;  it  denotes  those 
notional  assents  which  are  the  most  direct,  explicit, 
and  perfect  of  their  kind,  viz.,  those  which  are  the 
firm,  conscious  acceptance  of  propositions  as  true; 
this  kind  of  assent  includes  the  assent  to  all  reason- 
ing and  its  conclusions,  to  all  general  propositions, 
to  all  rules  of  conduct,  to  all  proverbs,  aphorisms, 
sayings,  and  reflections  on  men  and  society,  73. 

"Speculative  Certitude/'  326. 

Speculator,  —  vide  Theorist. 

Spelman,  276,  428. 

Spenser,  276. 

"Stat  pro  ratione  voluntas,"  171. 

Statement  of  the  Case:  the  statement  of  the  case 
depends  on  the  particular  aspect  under  which  w^e 
view  a  subject,  that  is,  on  the  abstraction  which 
forms  our  representative  notion  of  what  it  is,  371-2; 


198  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Statement  of  the  Case:  continued. 

thus,  (1)  one  of  the  simplest  and  broadest  aspects 
under  which  to  view  the  physical  world  is  that  of  a 
system  of  final  causes,  or,  on  the  other  hand,  of 
initial    or   effective   causes,    372    (vide    Bacon),  — 

(2)  a  great  lawyer,  judge,  or  advocate  sometimes 
is  able  in  perplexed  cases  to  detect  the  principle 
which  rightly  interprets  the  riddle,  and  converts  a 
chaos  into  an  orderly  and  luminous  whole,  372,  — 

(3)  such  aspects  are  often  unreal,  as  being  mere 
exhibitions  of  ingenuity,  not  of  true  originality  of 
mind;  this  is  especially  the  case  in  what  are  called 
philosophical  views  of  history,  372-3,  —  (4)  the 
aspect  under  which  we  view  things  is  often  intensely 
personal;  each  of  us  looks  at  the  world  in  his  own 
way,  and  does  not  know  that  perhaps  it  is  charac- 
teristically his  own;  this  is  the  case  even  as  regards 
the  senses;  some  men  have  little  perception  of  colours; 
some  recognize  one  or  two;  how  poorly  can  we  ap- 
preciate the  beauties  of  nature,  if  our  eyes  discern, 
on  the  face  of  things,  only  an  Indian-ink  or  a  drab 
creation!  373,  —  (5)  each  of  us  abstracts  the  rela- 
tion of  line  to  line  in  his  own  personal  way,  —  as 
one  man  might  apprehend  a  curve  as  convex, 
another  as  concave;  again,  when  it  has  been  asked  in 
a  chance  company,  which  way  certain  of  the  great 
letters  of  the  alphabet  look,  one  half  of  the  party 
considered  the  letters  in  question  to  look  to  the  left, 
while  the  other  half  thought  they  looked  to  the 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  199 

Statement  of  the  Case:  continued. 

right,  373-4,  —  (6)  men  form  distinct  judgments 
upon  hand-writing;  some  men  may  have  a  talent 
for  deciphering  from  it  the  intellectual  and  moral 
character  of  the  writer,  which  others  have  not,  374, 
—  (7)  at  the  beginning  of  this  century,  it  was  a  sub- 
ject of  serious,  nay,  of  angry  controversy,  whether 
it  began  with  January  1800,  or  January  1801,  375; 
these  instances,  because  they  are  so  casual,  suggest 
how  it  comes  to  pass,  that  men  differ  so  widely  from 
each  other  in  religious  and  moral  perceptions,  375 
(vide  Truth). 

Stoic,  38,  39,  250. 

^'  Strong  consolation,"  239. 

"Struggling  in  the  storms  of  fate,"  38. 

Styx,  460. 

Subject:  the  subject  of  a  proposition  need  not  be 
apprehended  per  se  in  order  to  a  genuine  assent: 
for  it  is  the  very  thing  which  the  predicate  has  to 
elucidate,  and  therefore  by  its  formal  place  in  the 
proposition,  so  far  as  it  is  the  subject,  it  is  some- 
thing unknown,  something  which  the  predicate 
makes  known,  14. 

Substance:  the  evidence  which  we  have  of  the  pres- 
ence of  the  individual  beings  which  surround  us 
lies  in  the  phenomena  which  address  our  senses, 
and  our  warrant  for  taking  these  for  evidence  is 
our  instinctive  certitude  that  they  are  evidence; 
by  the  law  of  our  nature  we  associate  those  sensible 


200  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Substance:  continued. 

phenomena  or  impressions  with  certain  units,  in- 
dividuals, substances,  whatever  they  are  to  be 
called,  which  are  outside  and  out  of  the  reach  of 
sense,  and  we  picture  them  to  ourselves  in  those 
phenomena,  102-3  (vide  Phenomena). 

Suetonius:  quoted,  444,  477. 

"Suffered  all  nations  to  walk  in  their  own  ways,"  401. 

Suffering:  all  human  suffering  is  in  its  last  resolution 
the  punishment  of  sin,  407;  vide  Natural  Relig- 
ion, Evil,  and  Atonement. 

Supreme  Being,  —  vide  God. 

Surgery,  —  vide  Medicine. 

Switzerland,  303. 

Syllogism:  first  shoot  round  corners,  and  you  may 
not  despair  of  converting  by  a  syllogism;  tell  men 
to  gain  notions  of  a  Creator  from  His  works,  and,  if 
they  were  to  set  about  it  (which  nobody  does)  they 
would  be  jaded  and  wearied  by  the  labyrinth  they 
were  tracing;  their  minds  would  be  gorged  and  sur- 
feited by  the  logical  operation,  94  (vide  Science, 
and  Religion);  the  first  step  in  the  inferential 
method  is  to  throw  the  question  to  be  decided  into 
the  form  of  a  proposition;  then  to  throw  the  proof 
itself  into  propositions,  the  force  of  the  proof  lying 
in  the  comparison  of  these  propositions  with  each 
other;  when  the  analysis  is  carried  out  fully  and  put 
into  form,  it  becomes  the  Aristotelic  syllogism,  263 
(vide  Certitude,  Universals,  Logic,  Formal  In- 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  201 

Syllogism:  continued. 

FERENCE,  and  Informal  Inference);  Aristotelic 
argumentation  compares  two  given  words  sep- 
arately with  a  third,  and  then  determines  how 
they  stand  towards  each  other,  in  a  bond  fide 
identity  of  sense;  in  consequence,  its  formal  pro- 
cess is  best  conducted  by  means  of  symbols,  A, 
B,  and  C;  while  it  keeps  to  these,  it  is  safe;  it  has 
the  cogency  of  mathematical  reasoning,  and  draws 
its  conclusions  by  a  rule  as  unerring  as  it  is  blind; 
symbolical  notation,  then,  being  the  perfection  of 
the  syllogistic  method,  it  follows  that,  when  words 
are  substituted  for  symbols,  it  will  be  its  aim  to 
circumscribe  and  stint  their  import  as  much  as 
possible,  lest  perchance  A  should  not  always  exactly 
mean  A,  and  B  mean  B,  266  (vide  Words);  syl- 
logisms have  little  to  do  with  the  formation  of 
opinion,  277;  example  of  a  syllogism  presented  to 
an  educated,  thoughtful  Protestant  for  his  accept- 
ance, 288;  a  syllogism  is  a  demonstration  when  the 
premisses  are  granted,  293;  syllogism,  though  of 
course  it  has  its  use,  still  does  only  the  minutest  and 
easiest  part  of  the  work,  in  the  investigation  of 
truth,  for  when  there  is  any  difficulty,  that  difficulty 
commonly  lies  in  determining  first  principles,  not  in 
the  arrangement  of  proofs,  270;  it  is  by  the  strength, 
variety,  or  multiplicity  of  premisses,  which  are  only 
probable,  not  by  invincible  syllogisms,  —  by  ob- 
jections overcome,  by  adverse  theories  neutralized, 


202  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Syllogism:  continued. 

by  difficulties  gradually  clearing  up,  by  exceptions 
proving  the  rule,  by  unlooked-for  correlations  found 
with  received  truths,  by  suspense  and  delay  in  the 
process  issuing  in  triumphant  reactions,  —  by  all 
these  ways,  and  many  others,  it  is  that  the  prac- 
tised and  experienced  mind  is  able  to  make  a  sure 
divination  that  a  conclusion  is  inevitable,  of  which 
his  lines  of  reasoning  do  not  actually  put  him  in 
possession,  321;  if  I  am  asked  to  use  Paley's  argu- 
ment for  my  own  conversion,  I  say  plainly  I  do 
not  want  to  be  converted  by  a  smart  syllogism;  if  I 
am  asked  to  convert  others  by  it,  I  say  plainly  I  do 
not  care  to  overcome  their  reason  without  touching 
their  hearts,  425;  vide  Language,  and  Mind. 

Sylvester,  Professor:  "Professor  Sylvester  has  just 
discovered  the  proof  of  Sir  Isaac  Newton's  rule  for 
ascertaining  the  imaginary  roots  of  equations,"  333, 

Symphorian,  of  Autun:  words  of,  482. 

Systematizers,  —  vide  Action  of  Life 


Ta  vpaKTOL,  353  note. 

Tacitus:  27,  296,  297;  quoted,  443-4,  469-70. 

"Take,  my  brethren,  for  an  example  of  suffering  evil," 

etc.,  453. 
"Take  to  Himself  His  great  power  and  reign,"  485. 
Targum,  442  note. 
Tartarus,  460. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  203 

Taste:  vide  Beautiful;  taste,  skill,  invention  in  the 
fine  arts  —  and  so,  again,  discretion  or  judgment  in 
conduct  —  are  exerted  spontaneously,  when  once 
acquired,  and  could  not  give  a  clear  account  of 
themselves,  or  of  their  mode  of  proceeding;  they  do 
not  go  by  rule,  though  to  a  certain  point  their  exer- 
cise may  be  analyzed,  and  may  take  the  shape  of  an 
art  or  method,  338. 

Tastes,  memory  of,  —  vide  Memory. 

Taylor,  Jeremy:  142,  145;  quoted,  143-4. 

Te  Deum,  133. 

"Te  quoque  mensorem,"  296. 

Tell,  Willl\m,  10. 

Terence,  296,  297. 

Tertullian:  quoted,  469,  475,  485-6. 

Test,  —  vide  Criterion. 

*'  The  birds  of  the  air  should  dwell  in  its  branches,"  456. 

"The  foolishness  of  preaching,"  453. 

"The  foreknowledge  of  the  Father,"  etc.,  138. 

"The  Holy  Ghost  is  God":  as  to  the  Divinity  of  the 
Holy  Ghost,  consider  the  breviary  offices  for  Pente- 
cost and  its  Octave,  the  grandest,  perhaps,  in  the 
whole  year;  are  they  created  out  of  mere  abstrac- 
tions and  inferences,  or  what  are  sometimes  called 
metaphysical  distinctions,  or  has  not  the  categorical 
proposition  of  St.  Athanasius,  "The  Holy  Ghost  is 
God,"  such  a  place  in  the  imagination  and  the  heart 
as  suffices  to  give  birth  to  the  noble  Hymns  Veni 
Creator,  and   Veni  Sancte  Spiritus?  140. 


204  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

''The  hope  of  glory,"  452. 

"The  king  can  do  no  wrong,"  67. 

"The  kingdom  is  like  to  a  net,"  etc.,  455. 

"The  knowledge  of  salvation  in  the  remission  of  sins," 
253. 

"The  meek  shall  inherit  the  earth,"  452. 

"The  Messias  is  God":  all  through  the  Old  Testament, 
what  is  it  which  gives  an  interpretation  and  a  per- 
suasive power  to  so  many  passages  and  portions, 
especially  of  the  Psalms  and  the  Prophets,  but  this 
same  theological  formula,  ''The  Messias  is  God,"  a 
proposition  which  never  could  thus  vivify  in  the 
religious  mind  the  letter  of  the  sacred  text,  unless 
it  appealed  to  the  imagination,  and  could  be  held 
with  a  much  stronger  assent  than  any  that  is  merely 
notional,  139. 

"The  mind's  eye,"  23. 

"The  mystery  which  had  been  hidden  from  ages  and 
generations,"  etc.,  452. 

"The  pillar  and  ground  of  the  Truth,"  149. 

"The  Psalm  that  gathers  in  one  glorious  lay,"  etc.,  133. 

"The  quality  of  mercy  is  not  strained,"  15. 

"The  sceptre  shall  not  be  taken  away  from  Judah," 
etc.,  442. 

"The  Son  is  God":  what  an  illustration  of  the  real 
assent  which  can  be  given  to  this  proposition,  and 
its  power  over  our  affections  and  emotions,  is  the 
first  half  of  the  first  chapter  of  St.  John's  gospel!  or 
again  the  vision  of  our  Lord  in  the  first  chapter  of 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  205 

"  The  Son  is  God  ":  continued. 
the  Apocalpyse!  or  the  first  chapter  of  St.  John's 
first  Epistle!  again,  how  burning  are  St.  Paul's 
words  when  he  speaks  of  our  Lord's  crucifixion  and 
death!  what  is  the  secret  of  that  flame,  but  this 
same  dogmatic  sentence,  "The  Son  is  God"?  why- 
should  the  death  of  the  Son  be  more  awful  than  any 
other  death,  except  that  He,  though  man,  was  God? 
138-9. 

"The  time  is  accomplished,  and  the  kingdom  of  God 
is  at  hand,"  etc.,  451. 

"The  weak  things  of  the  earth  confound  the  strong," 
453. 

"The  wicked  flees,  when  no  one  pursueth,"  110. 

"The  word  of  God  has  been  made  of  none  effect  by 
the  traditions  of  men,"  246. 

Theism,  245,  433. 

Theist:  85,  101,  103;  no  one  is  to  be  called  a  Theist, 
who  does  not  believe  in  a  Personal  God,  124. 

Theobald,  271,  272,  274,  275,  276. 

Theocracy,  433. 

Theodoret:  quoted,  469. 

Theological  Opinion,  —  vide  Opinion. 

Theology:  theology,  as  such,  always  is  notional,  as 
being  scientific,  55,  140;  vide  God,  and  Dogmatic 
Theology. 

Theophorus,  479. 

Theorist:  what  is  the  meaning  of  the  distrust,  which 
is  ordinarily  felt,  of  speculators  and  theorists   but 


206  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Theorist:  continued. 

this,  that  they  are  dead  to  the  necessity  of  personal 
prudence  and  judgment  to  qualify  and  complete 
their  logic?  278-9. 

Theotocos,  245. 

"There's  a  Divinity  that  shapes  our  ends/'  etc.,  85. 

"There's  nae  luck,"  28. 

Thessalian,  477. 

Theudas,  450. 

Thing:  all  things  in  the  exterior  world  are  unit  and 
individual,  and  are  nothing  else,  9;  vide  Concrete. 

"Thirty  days  has  September,"  337. 

"Thou  hast  hid  these  things  from  the  wise  and  pru- 
dent," etc.,  467. 

"Thou  hast  no  speculation  in  those  eyes,"  73. 

Thought:  to  meddle  with  the  springs  of  thought  and 
action  is  really  to  weaken  them,  217  (vide  Intro- 
spection) ;  vide  Mind. 

Thoughts,  Pascal's:  quoted,  307-8,  310-11. 

Tiberius,  27,  28,  469. 

TiBURTius,  St.,  477. 

Titus:  32;  siege  of  Jerusalem  by  Titus,  435. 

Toledo,  Council  of,  134. 

Tory,  32,  85. 

"Totus,  teres,  atque  rotundus,"  126. 

Trade,  14. 

Trajan:  470,  478;  his  words  to  St.  Ignatius,  the  dis- 
ciple of  the  Apostles,  479. 

Translation:  in  literary  examinations,  it  is  a  test  of 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  207 

Translation:  continued. 

good  scholarship  to  be  able  to  construe  aright, 
without  the  aid  of  understanding  the  sentiment, 
action,  or  historical  occurrence  conveyed  in  the 
passage  thus  accurately  rendered,  let  it  be  a  battle 
in  Livy,  or  some  subtle  train  of  thought  in  Virgil  or 
Pindar,  22. 

"  Tres  et  Unus  "  is  the  key-note,  as  it  may  be  called, 
of  the  Athanasian  Creed,  125. 

Trials,  —  vide  Scripture. 

Tridentine  Canons:  quoted,  146. 

Trinity:  the  word  "Trinity"  belongs  to  those  notions 
of  the  Supreme  Being  w^hich  are  forced  on  us  by  the 
necessity  of  our  finite  conceptions,  the  real  and 
immutable  distinction  which  exists  between  Person 
and  Person  implying  in  itself  no  infringement  of 
His  real  and  numerical  Unity,  50;  vide  Holy 
Trinity. 

True  and  False,  —  vide  Principles,  First. 

Trust  in  our  powers  of  reasoning  and  memory,  —  vide 
Faculty,  and  Self. 

Truth:  what  to  one  intellect  is  a  proof  is  not  so  to 
another,  and  the  certainty  of  a  proposition  does  not 
properly  consist  in  the  certitude  of  the  mind  which 
contemplates  it;  and  this  of  course  may  be  said 
without  prejudice  to  the  objective  truth  or  false- 
hood of  propositions,  since  it  does  not  follow  that 
these  propositions  on  the  one  hand  are  not  true,  and 
based  on  right  reason,  and  those  on  the  other  not 


208  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Truth:  continued. 
false,  and  based  on  false  reason,  because  not  all  men 
discriminate  them  in  the  same  way,  293;  the  force 
of  Pascal's  argument  depending  upon  the  assump- 
tion that  the  facts  of  Christianity  are  beyond  human 
nature,  therefore,  according  as  the  powers  of  nature 
are  placed  at  a  high  or  low  standard,  that  force  will 
be  greater  or  less;  and  that  standard  will  vary  ac- 
cording to  the  respective  dispositions,  opinions,  and 
experiences  of  those  to  whom  the  argument  is 
addressed;  thus  its  value  is  a  personal  question;  not 
as  if  there  were  not  an  objective  truth  and  Chris- 
tianity as  a  whole  not  supernatural,  but  that,  when 
we  come  to  consider  where  it  is  that  the  supernatural 
presence  is  found,  there  may  be  fair  differences  of 
opinion,  both  as  to  the  fact  and  the  proof  of  what  is 
supernatural,  310;  shall  we  say  that  there  is  no  such 
thing  as  truth  and  error,  but  that  anything  is  truth 
to  a  man  which  he  troweth?  and  not  rather,  as  the 
solution  of  a  great  mystery,  that  truth  there  is,  and 
attainable  it  is,  but  that  its  rays  stream  in  upon  us 
through  the  medium  of  our  moral  as  well  as  our 
intellectual  being;  and  that  in  consequence  that 
perception  of  its  first  principles  which  is  natural 
to  us  is  enfeebled,  obstructed,  perverted,  by  allure- 
ments of  sense  and  the  supremacy  of  self,  and,  on 
the  other  hand,  quickened  by  aspirations  after  the 
supernatural?  311;  it  does  not  prove  that  there  is 
no  objective  truth,  because  not  all  men  are  in  pos- 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  209 

Truth:  continued. 
session  of  it;  or  that  we  are  not  responsible  for  the 
associations  which  we  attach,  and  the  relations 
which  we  assign,  to  the  objects  of  the  intellect;  but 
this  it  does  suggest  to  us,  that  there  is  something 
deeper  in  our  differences  than  the  accident  of  external 
circumstances;  and  that  we  need  the  interposition 
of  a  Power,  greater  than  human  teaching  and  human 
argument,  to  make  our  beliefs  true  and  our  minds 
one,  375  (vide  Statement  of  the  Case);  truth 
certainly,  as  such,  rests  upon  grounds  intrinsically 
and  objectively  and  abstractedly  demonstrative, 
but  it  does  not  follow  from  this  that  the  arguments 
producible  in  its  favour  are  unanswerable  and  irre- 
sistible; these  latter  epithets  are  relative,  and  bear 
upon  matters  of  fact ;  arguments  in  themselves  ought 
to  do  what  perhaps  in  the  particular  case  they  can- 
not do;  the  fact  of  revelation  is  in  itself  demon- 
strably true,  but  it  is  not  therefore  true  irresistibly; 
else,  how  comes  it  to  be  resisted?  there  is  a  vast 
distance  between  what  it  is  in  itself,  and  what  it  is 
to  us;  light  is  a  quality  of  matter,  as  truth  is  of 
Christianity;  but  light  is  not  recognized  by  the  blind, 
and  there  are  those  who  do  not  recognize  truth,  from 
the  fault,  not  of  truth,  but  of  themselves,  410;  since 
a  Good  Providence  watches  over  us,  He  blesses  such 
means  of  argument  as  it  has  pleased  Him  to  give  us, 
in  the  nature  of  man  and  of  the  world,  if  we  use 
them  duly  for  those  ends  for  which  He  has  given 


210  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Truth:  continued. 

them;  and,  as  in  mathematics  we  are  justified  by 
the  dictate  of  nature  in  withholding  our  assent  from 
a  conclusion  of  which  we  have  not  yet  a  strict  logical 
demonstration,  so  by  a  like  dictate  we  are  not  justi- 
fied, in  the  case  of  concrete  reasoning  and  especially 
of  religious  inquiry,  in  waiting  till  such  logical 
demonstration  is  ours,  but  on  the  contrary  are  bound 
in  conscience  to  seek  truth  and  to  look  for  certainty 
by  modes  of  proof,  which,  when  reduced  to  the 
shape  of  formal  propositions,  fail  to  satisfy  the  se- 
vere requisitions  of  science,  412  (vide  Probabil- 
ities, and  Mind);  it  is  the  way  with  some  men  to 
pronounce  that  there  is  no  religious  love  of  truth 
where  there  is  fear  of  error;  on  the  contrary,  I  would 
maintain  that  the  fear  of  error  is  simply  necessary 
to  the  genuine  love  of  truth;  no  inquiry  comes  to 
good  which  is  not  conducted  under  a  deep  sense  of 
responsibility,  and  of  the  issues  depending  upon  its 
determination,  426;  in  considering  Christianity,  New- 
man starts  with  conditions  different  from  Paley's; 
not  as  undervaluing  the  force  and  the  serviceable- 
ness  of  his  argument,  but  as  preferring  inquiry  to 
disputation  in  a  question  about  truth,  427  (vide 
Syllogism);  vide  Conscientiousness,  Concrete, 
and  Man;  test  of  truth,  —  vide  Criterion. 

Truth-Like:  the  object  of  assent  is  a  truth,  the 
object  of  inference  is  the  truth-like  or  a  verisimili- 
tude, 259. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  211 

Trypho:  quoted,  468. 
Turkey,  303,  304. 

u 

Uncertitude:  instances  of  an  adherence  to  proposi- 
tions, which  does  not  fulfil  the  conditions  of  cer- 
titude, 200-2;  the  various  phenomena  of  mind 
referred  to,  though  signs,  are  not  infallible  signs 
of  uncertitude;  they  may  proceed,  in  the  particular 
case,  from  other  circumstances;  such  anxieties  and 
alarms  may  be  merely  emotional  and  from  the 
imagination,  not  intellectual;  a  man's  over-earnest- 
ness in  argument  may  arise  from  zeal  or  charity;  his 
impatience  from  loyalty  to  the  truth;  his  extrava- 
gance from  want  of  taste,  from  enthusiasm,  or  from 
youthful  ardour;  and  his  restless  recurrence  to 
argument,  not  from  personal  disquiet,  but  from  a 
vivid  appreciation  of  the  controversial  talent  of  an 
opponent,  or  of  his  own,  or  of  the  mere  philosophical 
difficulties  of  the  subject  in  dispute;  but  these  points 
do  not  interfere  with  the  broad  principle,  that  to 
fear  argument  is  to  doubt  the  conclusion,  and  to  be 
certain  of  a  truth  is  to  be  careless  of  objections  to 
it,  202-3. 

Unconscious  Assent:  that  mode  of  assent  which  is 
exercised  unconsciously  is  simple  assent,  189;  in 
proportion  to  our  ignorance  of  self,  is  our  uncon- 
sciousness of  those  innumerable  acts  of  assent, 
which  we  are  incessantly  making;  and  so  again  in 


212  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Unconscious  Assent:  continued. 

what  may  be  almost  called  the  mechanical  opera- 
tion of  our  minds,  in  our  continual  acts  of  appre- 
hension and  inference,  speculation,  and  resolve, 
propositions  pass  before  us  and  receive  our  assent 
without  our  consciousness;  hence  it  is  that  we  are  so 
apt  to  confuse  together  acts  of  assent  and  acts  of 
inference,  188-9. 

Understanding:  the  word  understanding  is  of  uncer- 
tain meaning,  standing  sometimes  for  the  faculty 
or  act  of  conceiving  a  proposition,  sometimes  for 
that  of  comprehending  it;  it  is  possible  to  apprehend 
without  understanding,  19;  vide  Apprehension. 

Uniformity  of  the  laws  of  nature,  —  vide  Laws  of 
Nature. 

Unitarian,  245,  250. 

Unitarianism,  251. 

Universal:  what  is  not  universal  has  no  claim  to  be 
considered  natural,  right,  or  of  divine  origin;  thus 
we  may  determine  prayer  to  be  part  of  Natural 
Religion,  from  such  instances  of  the  usage  as  are 
supplied  by  the  priests  of  Baal  and  by  dancing 
Dervishes,  without  therefore  including  in  our  notions 
of  prayer  the  frantic  excesses  of  the  one,  or  the  artis- 
tic spinning  of  the  other,  or  sanctioning  their  respec- 
tive objects  of  belief,  Baal  or  Mahomet,  404;  what 
is  universal  is  natural,  405. 

Universals:  universals  are  ever  at  war  with  each 
other;  what  is  called  a  universal  is  only  a  general; 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  213 

Universals:  continued. 

what  is  only  general  does  not  lead  to  a  necessary 
conclusion;  "  Latet  dolus  in  generalibus " ;  they  are 
arbitrary  and  fallacious,  if  we  take  them  for  more 
than  broad  views  and  aspects  of  things,  serving  as 
our  notes  and  indications  for  judging  of  the  par- 
ticular, but  not  absolutely  touching  and  determining 
facts,  279;  let  units  come  first,  and  (so-called)  uni- 
versals second;  let  universals  minister  to  units,  not 
units  be  sacrificed  to  universals;  John,  Richard,  and 
Robert  are  individual  things,  independent,  incom- 
municable; we  may  find  some  kind  of  common 
measure  between  them,  and  we  may  give  it  the  name 
of  man,  man  as  such,  the  typical  man,  the  aiito- 
anthropos;  we  are  justified  in  so  doing,  and  in  in- 
vesting it  with  general  attributes,  and  bestowing 
on  it  what  we  consider  a  definition;  but  we  think  we 
may  go  on  to  impose  our  definition  on  the  whole 
race,  and  to  every  member  of  it;  each  of  them  is 
what  he  is,  in  spite  of  it;  not  any  one  of  them  is  man, 
as  such,  or  coincides  with  the  auto-anthropos; 
another  John  is  not  necessarily  rational,  because  "all 
men  are  rational,"  for  he  may  be  an  idiot;  since,  as 
a  rule,  men  are  rational,  progressive,  and  social, 
there  is  a  high  probability  of  this  rule  being  true  in 
the  case  of  a  particular  person;  but  we  must  know 
him  to  be  sure  of  it,  279-80  (vide  Nature);  this 
illustrated  in  the  case  of  Elias,  280-1;  vide  Man; 
no  real  thing  admits,  by  any  calculus  of  logic,  of 


214  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Universals:  continued. 

being  dissected  into  all  the  possible  general  notions 
which  it  admits,  nor,  in  consequence,  of  being  re- 
composed  out  of  them;  though  the  attempt  thus  to 
treat  it  is  more  unpromising  in  proportion  to  the 
intricacy  and  completeness  of  its  make;  we  cannot 
see  through  any  one  of  the  myriad  beings  which 
make  up  the  universe,  or  give  the  full  catalogue  of 
its  belongings;  we  are  accustomed,  indeed,  and 
rightly,  to  speak  of  the  Creator  Himself  as  incom- 
prehensible; and,  indeed.  He  is  so  by  an  incom- 
municable attribute;  but  in  a  certain  sense  each  of 
His  creatures  is  incomprehensible  to  us  also,  in  the 
sense  that  no  one  has  a  perfect  understanding  of 
them  but  He;  we  recognize  and  appropriate  aspects 
of  them,  and  logic  is  useful  to  us  in  registering  these 
aspects  and  what  they  imply;  but  it  does  not  give 
us  to  know  even  one  individual  being,  282-3  (vide 
Logic). 

Universe:  if  we  may  justly  regard  the  universe, 
according  to  the  meaning  of  the  word,  as  one  whole, 
we  may  also  believe  justly  that  to  know  one  part 
of  it  is  necessarily  to  know  much  more  than  that 
one  part,  260. 

University  Sermons,  Newman's,  396  note. 

"Unknown  God,"  388. 

*' Unusquisque  in  suo  sensu  abundet,"  411. 

"Urbem,  quam  dicunt  Romam,  Meliboee,  putavi," 
etc.,  26. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  215 

Useful  Arts:  as  regards  the  useful  arts  and  personal 
accomplishments,  we  use  the  word  "skill/'  but 
proficiency  in  engineering  or  in  ship-building,  or 
again  in  engraving,  or  again  in  singing,  in  playing 
instruments,  in  acting,  or  in  gymnastic  exercises,  is 
as  simply  one  with  its  particular  subject-matter  as 
the  human  soul  with  its  particular  body,  and  is,  in 
its  own  department,  a  sort  of  instinct  or  inspiration, 
not  an  obedience  to  external  rules  of  criticism  or  of 
science,  358. 

"Usum  non  tollit  abusus,"  232. 

"Ut  pueris  placeat  et  declamatio  fiat,"  490. 

Utica,  484. 

V 

Vandals,  376. 

"Varium  et  mutabile  semper  foemina,"  11,  64. 

Vengeance:  the  doctrine  of  retributive  punishment, 
or  of  divine  vengeance,  is  not  incompatible  with  the 
true  religion,  419-20;  it  is  even  far  from  clear  that 
an  act  of  vengeance  must,  as  such,  be  a  sin  in  our 
own  instance;  but,  first  from  the  certainty  that,  if 
habitual,  it  will  run  into  excess  and  become  sin,  and 
next  because  the  office  of  punishment  has  not  been 
committed  to  us,  and  further  because  it  is  a  feeling 
unsuitable  to  those  who  are  themselves  so  laden 
with  imperfection  and  guilt,  therefore  vengeance, 
in  itself  allowable,  is  forbidden  to  us;  these  excep- 
tions do  not  hold  in  the  case  of  a  perfect  being,  and 


216  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Vengeance  :  continued. 

certainly  not  in  the  instance  of  the  Supreme  Judge; 
nor  must  it  be  forgotten,  that  retributive  justice  is 
the  very  attribute  under  which  God  is  primarily 
brought  before  us  in  the  teachings  of  our  natural 
conscience,  420  (vide  Conscience);  and  further, 
we  cannot  determine  the  character  of  particular 
actions,  till  we  have  the  whole  case  before  us  out  of 
which  they  arise;  unless,  indeed,  they  are  in  them- 
selves distinctively  vicious;  it  is  difficult  to  trace 
the  path  and  to  determine  the  scope  of  Divine 
Providence;  we  read  of  a  day  when  the  Almighty 
will  condescend  to  place  His  actions  in  their  com- 
pleteness before  His  creatures;  if,  till  then,  we  feel 
it  to  be  a  duty  to  suspend  our  judgment  concerning 
certain  of  His  actions  or  precepts,  we  do  no  more 
than  what  we  do  every  day  in  the  case  of  an  earthly 
friend  or  enemy,  whose  conduct  in  some  point 
requires  explanation,  420-1   (vide  Providence). 

Veni  Creator,  133,  140. 

Veni  Sancte  Spiritus,  140. 

"Verily  Thou  art  a  hidden  God,"  etc.,  352. 

Verisimilitude,  —  vide  Truth-Like. 

Vestal  Virgins,  10. 

Vettius  Epagathus,  481. 

Vice  "from  its  hardness  takes  a  polish  too,"  47. 

Victoria,  225. 

Vince  on  the  proofs  of  the  earth's  rotatory  motion, 
318-19. 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  217 

Virgil,  11,  22,  26,  29,  296,  297,  308. 

Virtual  Certitude,  —  vide  Material  Certitude. 

Virtue:  as  we  form  our  notion  of  whiteness  from  the 
actual  sight  of  snow,  milk,  a  lily,  or  a  cloud,  so, 
after  experiencing  the  sentiment  of  approbation 
which  arises  in  us  on  the  sight  of  certain  acts  one  by 
one,  we  go  on  to  assign  to  that  sentiment  a  cause, 
and  to  those  acts  a  quality,  and  we  give  to  this 
notional  cause  or  quality  the  name  of  virtue,  which 
is  an  abstraction,  not  a  thing,  64;  there  are  a  hundred 
memories,  as  there  are  a  hundred  virtues;  virtue  is 
one  indeed  in  the  abstract;  but,  in  fact,  gentle  and 
kind  natures  are  not  therefore  heroic,  and  prudent 
and  self-controlled  minds  need  not  be  open-handed; 
at  the  utmost  such  virtue  is  one  only  in  posse;  as 
developed  in  the  concrete,  it  takes  the  shape  of 
species  which  in  no  sense  imply  each  other,  341  (vide 
Ratiocinative  Faculty,  and  Phronesis). 

"Virtue  itself  turns  vice,  being  misapplied,"  15-16. 

''Vox  et  praeterea  nihil,"  276. 

Vulgate,  442. 

w 

Wallace,  10. 

Warburton,  373. 

Warton,  46. 

Watchwords:  as  regards  political  and  religious  watch- 
words, first  one  man  of  name  and  then  another 
adopts  them,  till  their  use  becomes  popular,  and 


218  AN  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF 

Watchwords:  continued. 

then  every  one  professes  them,  because  every  one 
else  does;  such  words  are  "liberality,"  "progress," 
"private  judgment,"  " Ultramontanism " — all  of 
which,  in  the  mouths  of  conscientious  thinkers,  have 
a  definite  meaning,  but  are  used  by  the  multitude  as 
war-cries,  nicknames,  and  shibboleths,  with  scarcely 
enough  of  the  scantiest  grammatical  apprehension 
of  them  to  allow  of  their  being  considered  in  truth 
more  than  assertions,  43-4  (vide  Mere  Assertion). 

"We  are  reviled  and  bless,"  etc.,  453. 

"We  hunger  and  thirst,  and  are  naked,"  etc.,  453. 

"We  preach  Christ  crucified,"  466. 

Weather-Wise  Peasant,  332  (vide  Peasant) 

Wellington,  Duke  of,  32,  76-7,  78,  341. 

Wesley,  56. 

Wesleyan,  32. 

"  What  creature  is  that,  which  in  the  morning  goes  on 
four  legs,"  etc.,  48. 

"When  the  Lord  turned  the  captivity  of  Sion,"  etc., 
219-20. 

Whig,  32. 

"Who  is  she  that  looketh  forth  at  the  dawn,"  etc.,  378. 

"Who  knew  many  cities  of  men  and  many  minds,"  27. 

Wilberforce,  Mr.,  77,  78. 

"Will  overcome  when  He  is  judged,"  421. 

"With  eyes  too  tremblingly  awake,"  etc.,  203. 

"With  the  hearing  of  the  ear  I  have  heard  Thee,"  etc., 
80, 


THE  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT  219 

"With  the  upright  Thou  shalt  be  upright,"  etc.,  434. 

"Woe  is  unto  me  if  I  preach  not  the  Gospel,"  141. 

Wonderful:  wonderful  events  before  now  have  ap- 
parently been  nothing  but  coincidences,  certainly; 
but  they  do  not  become  less  wonderful  by  cata- 
loguing their  constituent  causes,  unless  we  also  show 
how  these  came  to  be  constituent,  458  (vide  Law). 

Wood  on  the  laws  of  motion,  322-3. 

Words:  logical  inference  proposes  to  provide  both  a 
test  and  a  common  measure  of  reasoning;  and  I 
think  it  will  be  found  partly  to  succeed  and  partly 
to  fail;  succeeding  so  far  as  words  can  in  fact  be 
found  for  representing  the  countless  varieties  and 
subtleties  of  human  thought,  failing  on  account  of 
the  fallacy  of  the  original  assumption,  that  what- 
ever can  be  thought  can  be  adequately  expressed 
in  words,  264;  words,  which  denote  things,  have 
innumerable  implications;  but  in  inferential  exer- 
cises it  is  the  very  triumph  of  that  clearness  and 
hardness  of  head,  which  is  the  characteristic  talent 
for  the  art,  to  have  stripped  them  of  all  these  con- 
natural senses,  to  have  drained  them  of  that  depth 
and  breadth  of  associations  which  constitute  their 
poetry,  their  rhetoric,  and  their  historical  life,  to 
have  starved  each  term  down  till  it  has  become  the 
ghost  of  itself,  and  everywhere  one  and  the  same 
ghost,  "omnibus  umbra  locis,"  so  that  it  may  stand 
for  just  one  unreal  aspect  of  the  concrete  thing  to 
which  it  properly  belongs,  for  a  relation,  a  generaliza- 


220  INDEXED  SYNOPSIS  OF  GRAMMAR  OF  ASSENT 

Words:  continued. 

tion,  or  other  abstraction,  for  a  notion  neatly  turned 
out  of  the  laboratory  of  the  mind,  and  sufficiently 
tame  and  subdued,  because  existing  only  in  a  defini- 
tion, 267  (vide  Syllogism,  and  Language). 

World,  —  vide  External  World. 

Writing  is  a  memoria  technica,  or  logic  of  the  memory, 
337,  261. 

Y-Z 

"You  shall  be  hated  of  all  men  for  My  name's  sake," 

452. 
"Your  life  is  hid  with  Christ  in  God,"  etc.,  466. 

Zoologist:  the  Proverb  says,  "Ex  pede  Herculem"; 
and  we  have  actual  experience  how  the  practised 
zoologist  can  build  up  some  intricate  organization 
from  the  sight  of  its  smallest  bone,  evoking  the 
whole  as  if  it  were  a  remembrance,  260-1. 


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the  Resurrection— Chnstian  Reverence— The  Religion  of  the  Day— Scripture  a  Record  of 
Human  Sorrow — Christian  Manhood. 

Contents  of  Vol.  II.  :  The  World's  Benefactors— Faith  without  Sight— The  Incar- 
nation— Martyrdom— Love  of  Relations  and  Friends — The  Mind  of  Little  Children— Cere- 
monies of  the  Church— The  Glory  of  the  Christian  Church— St.  Paul's  Conversion  viewed 
in  Reference  to  his  Office— Secrecy  and  Suddenness  of  Divine  Visitations— Divine  Decrees 
—The  Reverence  Due  to  the  Blessed  Virgin  Mary— Christ,  a  Quickening:  Spirit— Saving 
Knowledge— Self-Contemplation— Religious  Cowardice— The  Gospel  Witnesses— Myste- 
ries in  Religion— The  Indwelling  Spirit— The  Kingdom  of  the  Saints— The  Gospel,  .a  Trust 
Committee  to  us— Tolerance  of  Religious  Error— Rebuking  Sin— The  Chnstian  Ministry- 
Human  Responsibility— Guilelessness— The  Danger  of  Riches— The  Powers  of  Nature- 
The  Danger  of  Accomplishments— Christian  Zeal— Use  of  Saints'  Days. 

Contents  of  Vol.  III.  :  Abraham  and  Lot— Wilfulncis  of  Israel  in  Rejecting  Samuel- 
Saul— Early  Years  of  David— Jeroboam— Faith  and  Obedience— Christian  Repentance- 
Contracted  Views  in  Religion— A  particular  Providence  as  revealed  in  the  Gospel— Tc:irs 
of  Christ  at  the  Grave  of  Lazarus— Bodily  Suffering— The  Humiliation  of  the  Eternal  Son 
—Jewish  Zeal  a  Pattern  to  Christians— Submission  to  Chuich  Authority— Contest  t-ctwcen 
Truth  and  Falsehood  in  the  Church— The  Church  Visible  and  Invisible— The  Visible 
Church  an  Encouragement  to  Faith— The  Gift  of  the  Spirit— Regenerating  Baptism— Infant 
Baptism— The  Daily  Service— The  Good  Part  of  Mary— Rcliffious  Worship  a  Remedy  for 
Excitements — Intercession— The  Intermediate  Sutc. 


A  SELECTED  LIST  OF  WORKS 
Newman. — Works  by  Cardinal  Newman. — Continued. 

PAROCHIAL   AND    PLAIN   SERMONS.— C^«//««^d?: 

Contents  of  Vol.  IV.  :  The  Strictness  of  the  Law  of  Christ — Obedience  without  Love, 
as  instanced  in  the  Character  of  Balaam — Moral  Consequences  of  Single  Sins — Acceptance 
of  Religious  Privileges  Compulsory — Reliance  on  Religious  Observances — The  Individuality 
of  the  Soul— Chastisement  amid  Mercy — Peace  and  Joy  amid  Chastisement — The  State  of 
Grace — The  Visible  Church  for  the  Sake  of  the  Elect — The  Communion  of  Saints — The 
Church  a  Home  for  the  I-onely— The  Invisible  World— The  Greatness  and  Littleness  of 
Human  Life— Moral  Eftects  of  Communion  with  God— Christ  Hidden  from  the  World- 
Christ  Manifested  in  Remembrance— The  Gainsaying  of  Korah— The  Mysteriousness  of 
our  Present  Being— The  Ventures  of  Faith— Faith  and  Love— Watching— Keeping  Fast  and 
Festival. 

Contents  of  Vol.  V.  :  Worship,  a  Preparation  for  Christ's  Coming — Reverence,  a 
Belief  in  God's  Presence — Unreal  Words — Shnnking  from  Christ's  Coming — Equanimity' — 
Remembrance  of  Past  Mercies — The  Mystery  of  Godliness — The  State  of  Innocence — 
Christian  Sympathy— Righteousness  not  of  us,  but  in  us — The  Law  of  the  Spirit — The  New 
Works  of  the  Gospel — The  State  of  Salvation — Transgressions  and  Infirmities — Sins  of 
Infirmity — Sincerity  and  Hypocrisy — The  Testimony  of  Conscience — Many  called,  Few 
chosen — Present  Blessings — Endurance,  the  Christian's  Portion — Affliction,  a  School  of 
Comfort— The  Thought  of  God,  the  Stay  of  the  Soul— Love,  the  One  Thing  Needful— The 
Power  of  the  Will. 

Contents  of  Vol.  VI. :  Fasting,  a  Source  of  Trial — Life,  the  Season  of  Repentance- 
Apostolic  Abstinence,  a  Pattern  for  Christians — Christ's  Privations,  a  Meditation  for  Chris- 
tians— Christ  the  Son  of  God  made  Man — The  Incarnate  Son,  a  Sufferer  and  Sacrifice — 
The  Cross  of  Christ  the  Measure  of  the  World — Difficulty  of  realizmg  Sacred  Privileges — 
The  Gospel  Sign  Addressed  to  Faith— The  .Spiritual  Presence  of  Christ  in  the  Church — 
The  Eucharistic  Presence — Faith  the  Title  for  Justification — Judaism  of  the  Present  Day 
— The  Fellowship  of  the  Apostles — Rising  with  Christ — Warfare  the  Condition  of  Victory 
— Waiting  for  Christ — Subjection  of  the  Reason  and  Feelings  to  the  Revealed  Word — The 
Gospel  Palaces— The  Visible  Temple— Offerings  for  the  Sanctuary— The  Weapons  of 
Saints — Faith  Without  Demonstration — The  Mystery  of  the  Holy  Trinity — Peace  in  Be- 
lieving. 

Contents  of  Vol.  VII. :  The  Lapse  of  Time — Religion,  a  Weariness  to  the  Natural 
Man — The  World  our  Enemy — The  Praise  of  Men — Temporal  Advantages — ^The  Season 
of  Epiphany— The  Duty  of  Self-denial— The  Yoke  of  Christ— Moses  the  Type  of  Christ— 
The  Crucifixion— Attendance  on  Holy  Communion— The  Gospel  Feast— Love  of  Rehgion, 
a  new  Nature— Religion  pleasant  to  the  Religious— Mental  Prayer — Infant  Baptism— The 
Unity  of  the  Church— Steadfastness  in  the  Old  Paths. 

Contents  OF  Vol.  VIII.  :  Reverence  in  Worship— Divine  Calls— The  Trial  of  Saul— 
The  Call  of  David— Curiosity,  a  Temptation  to  Sin— Miracles  no  Remedy  for  Unbelief— Jo- 
siah,  a  Pattern  for  the  Ignorant— Inward  Witness  to  the  Truth  of  the  Gospel— Jeremiah, 
a  Lesson  for  the  Disappointed -Endurance  of  the  World's  Censure — Doing  Glory  to  God 
in  Pursuits  of  the  World — Vanity  of  Human  Glory — Truth  hidden  when  not  sought  after — 
Obedience  to  God  the  Way  to  Faith  in  Christ— Sudden  Conversions— The  Shepherd  of  our 
Souls — Religious  Joy — Ignorance  of  Evil. 

SERMONS  BEARING    UPON  SUBJECTS  OF    THE  DAY. 

Edited  by  the  Rev.  W.  J.  Copeland,   B.D,,  late  Rector  of  Farnham, 

Essex.     Crown  8vo.  $1-25 

Contents  :  The  Work  of  the  Christian— Saintliness  not  Forfeited  by  the  Penitent—Our 
Lord's  Last  Supper  and  His  First — Dangers  to  the  Penitent — The  Three  Offices  of  Christ- 
Faith  and  p:xperience— Faith  unto  the  World— The  Church  and  the  World— Indulgence  in 
Religious  Privileges— Connection  between  Personal  and  Public  Improvement— Christian  No- 
bleness— Joshua  a  Type  of  Christ  and  His  Followers — Elisha  a  Type  of  Christ  and  His  Fol- 
lowers—The Christian  Church  a  Continuation  of  the  Jewish— The  Principles  of  Continuity 
between  the  Jewish  and  Christian  Churches— The  Christian  Church  an  Imperial  Power- 
Sanctity  the  Token  of  the  Christian  Empire — Condition  of  the  Members  of  the  Christian 
Empire— The  Apostolic  Christian — Wisdom  and  Innocence — Invisible  Presence  of  Christ — 
Outward  and  Inward  Notes  of  the  Church— Grounds  for  Steadfastness  in  our  Religious  Pro- 
fession—Elijah the  Prophet  of  the  Latter  Days— Feasting  in  Captivity— The  Parting  of 
Friends. 


PUBLISHED  BY  LONGMANS,  GREEN,   <S-  CO.         3 

ITewman. — Works  by  Cardinal  Newman. — Continued. 

SERMONS     PREACHED     ON     VARIOUS      OCCASIONS. 

Crown  8vo.  $1.25 

Contents  :  Intellect  the  Instrument  of  Religious  Training— The  Religion  of  the  Phari- 
see and  the  Religion  of  Mankind — Waiting  for  Christ — The  Secret  Power  of  Divine  Grace — 
Dispositions  for  Faith — Onuiipotence  in  IJonds — St.  Paul's  Characteristic  Gift— St.  Paul's 
Gift  of  Sympathy — Christ  upon  the  Waters — The  Second  Spring — Order,  the  Witness  and 
Instrument  of  Unity — The  Mission  of  St.  PhiHp  Neri— The  Tree  beside  the  Waters — In 
the  World,  but  not  of  the  World — The  Pope  and  the  Revolution. 

FIFTEEN  SERMONS  PREACHED  BEFORE  THE  UNI- 
VERSITY OF  OXFORD,  between  A.D.  1826  and  1843.  New  Edition. 
Crown  8vo.  $1.25 

Contents  :  The  Philosophical  Temper,  first  enjoined  by  the  Gospel — ^The  Influence  of 
Natural  and  Revealed  Religion  respectively — Evangelical  Sanctity  the  Perfection  of  Natu- 
ral Virtue— The  Usurpations  of  Reason — Personal  Influence,  the  Means  of  Propagating  the 
Truth — On  Justice  as  a  Principle  of  Divine  Governance — Contest  between  Faith  and 
Sight — Human  Responsibility,  as  independent  of  Circumstances — Wilfulness,  the  Sin  of 
Saul — Faith  and  Reason,  contrasted  as  Habits  of  Mind — The  Nature  of  Faith  in  Relation 
to  Reason — Love  the  Safeguard  of  Faith  against  Superstition — Implicit  and  Explicit  Rea. 
son — Wisdom,  as  contrasted  with  Faith  and  with  Bigotry — The  Theory  of  Developments 
in  Religious  Doctrine. 

DISCOURSES  ADDRESSED  TO  MIXED  CONGREGA- 
TIONS.    Crown  8vo.  $1.25 

Contents  :  The  Salvation  of  the  Hearer  the  Motive  of  the  Preacher— Neglect  of 
Divine  Calls  and  Warnings — I\Ien  not  Angels — The  Priests  of  the  Gospel — Purity  and 
Love— Saindiness  the  Standard  of  Christian  Principle  — God's  Will  the  End  of  Life— Per- 
severance in  Grace— Nature  and  Grace— Illuminating  Grace— Faith  and  Private  Judg- 
ment— Faith  and  Doubt— Prospects  of  the  Catholic  Missioner — Mysteries  of  Nature  and 
of  Grace — The  Mystery  of  Divine  Condescension — The  Infinitude  of  Divine  Attributes — 
Mental  .Sufferings  of  Our  Lord  in  His  Passion — The  Glories  of  Mary  for  the  Sake  of  Her 
Son — On  the  Fitness  of  the  Glories  of  Mary. 

SELECTION,  ADAPTED  TO  THE  SEASONS  OF  THE 
ECCLESIASTICAL  YEAR,  from  the'"  Parochial  and  Plain  Sermons." 
Edited  by  the  Rev.  W.  J.  Copeland,  B.D.     Crown  8vo.  $1.25 

Contents  :  Advent:  Self-Denial  the  Test  of  Religious  Earnestness— Divine  Cills— 
The  Ventures  of  Faith— Watching.  Christmas  Day  :  Religious  Joy.  Ne-iv  Year's  Sun- 
day :  The  Lapse  of  Time.  Epiphany :  Remembrance  of  Past  Mercies— Equanirnity— 
The  Immortality  of  the  Soul— Christian  Manhood— Sincerity  and  Hypocrisy— Christian 
Sympathy.  Septuagesima  :  Present  Blessings.  Sexagesima  :  Endurance,  the  Chris- 
tian's Portion.  Quinquagesima  :  Love,  the  One  Thing  Needful.  Lent :  The  Individu- 
ality of  the  Soul— Life  the  Season  of  Repentance— Bodily  Suffering— Tears  of  Christ  at  the 
Grave  of  Lazarus— Christ's  Privations,  a  Meditation  for  Christians— The  Cross  of  Christ 
the  Measure  of  the  World.  Good  Friday:  The  Crucifi.vion.  Easter  Day:  Keeping 
Fast  and  Festival.  Easter  Tide  :  Witnesses  of  the  Resurrection — A  Particular  Providence 
as  Revealed  in  the  Gospel— Christ  Manifested  in  Remembrance— The  Invisible  World- 
Waiting  for  Christ.  Ascension  :  Warfare  the  Condition  of  Victory.  Sunday  after  Ascen- 
sion :  Rising  with  Christ.  Whitsun  Day  :  The  Weaiions  of  Saints.  Trinity  Sunday  : 
The  Mysteriousness  of  Our  Present  Being.  Sundays  after  Trinity:  Holiness  Neces- 
sary for  Future  Blessedness— The  Religious  Use  of  I'lxcited  Feelings— The  Self-Wise  In- 
quirer—Scripture a  Record  of  Human  Sorrow— The  Danger  of  Riches— Obedience  without 
Love,  as  instanced  in  the  Character  of  I'.alaam— Moral  Consequences  of  Single  Sins— The 
Greatness  and  Littleness  of  Human  Life- Moral  Kff-cts  of  Communion  with  God— The 
Thought  of  God  the  Stay  of  the  Soul— Tlio  Power  of  the  Will— 'Ihc  Gospel  Palaces— Re- 
ligion a  Weariness  to  the  Natural  M.in— The  World  our  Enemy— The  Praise  of  Mcri— Re- 
ligion Pleasant  to  the  Ri-hgious— Mental  I'rayer— Curiosity  a  Temptation  to  Sin — Miracles 
no  Remedy  for  Unbelief— Jeremiah,  a  Lesson  for  the  Disappointed — J'he  Shepherd  of  our 
Souls— Doing  Glory  to  God  in  Pursuits  of  the  World. 


A   SELECTED  LIST  OF    WORKS 


Newman. — Works  by  Cardinal  Newman. — Contmued. 

LECTURES  ON  THE  DOCTRINE  OF  JUSTIFICATION. 
Eighth  Edition.     Crown  8vo.  $1.25 

Contents  :  Faith  considered  as  the  Instrumental  Cause  of  Justification — Love  con- 
sidered as  the  Formal  Cause  of  Justitication — Primary  Sense  of  the  term  "Justification" 
— Secondary  Senses  of  the  term  "•Justification"— Misuse  ot  the  term  "Just"  or  "Right- 
eous"— The  Gift  of  Righteousness — The  Characteristics  of  the  Gift  of  Righteousness — 
Righteousness  viewed  as  a  Gift  and  as  a  QuaHty — Righteousness  the  Fruit  of  our  Lord's 
Resurrection — The  Office  of  Justifying  Faith — The  Nature  of  Justifying  Faith — Faith 
viewed  relatirely  to  Rites  and  Works — On  preaching  the  Gospel — Appendix. 

ON  THE  DEVELOPMENT  OF  CHRISTIAN    DOCTRINE. 

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ON    THE   IDEA  OF  A   UNIVERSITY.     Crown  8vo.     $1.25 

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can Church.  8.  The  Anglo-American  Church.  9.  Countess  of  Huntingdon. 
10.  Catholicity  of  the  Anglican  Church.  11.  The  Antichrist  of  Protestants. 
12.  Wilman's  Christianity.  13.  Reformation  of  the  XI.  Century.  14.  Private 
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Mediaeval  Oxford.     13.  Convocation  of  Canterbury. 

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SELECT  TREATISES  OF  ST.  ATHANASIUS  IN  CON- 
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PUBLISHED  BY  LONGMANS,   GREEN  &-   CO.  5 

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A   SELECTED  LIST  OF    WORKS 


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Whyte.— NEWMAN :  AN  APPRECIATION  IN  TWO 
LECTURES,  with  the  Choicest  Passages  of  his  Writings  Selected  and 
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"...  his  tone  of  kindly  sympathy  and  unfailing  courtesy  makes  his  book  very 
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make  it  very  useful  reading  .  .  .  contains  a  very  judiciously  selected  collection  of 
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ary study  of  Newman  will  find  Dr.  Whyte  a  valuable  g,nidQ."— Catholic  News,  New 
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occasion  of  his  acceptance  of  the  Cardinalate  conferred  upon  him  by  Pope  Leo  XIII, 
in  1878.  The  addresses  are  preceded  and  followed  by  an  account,  written  by  the  late 
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Newman's  subsequent  journey  and  projected  second  journey  to  Rome,  he  being  over 
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offer  and  Dr.  Newman's  acceptance  of  the  same  are  also  given. 

"  Lovers  of  the  great  and  saintly  Newman  will  be  thankful  for  this  little  volume.  It 
will  clear  up  for  many  the  scenes  attending  Newman's  elevation  to  the  Cardinalate. 
It  will  also  clear  up  for  many  the  character  of  Manning,  which  has  not  been  understood 
even  by  his  friends.  The  volume  contains  the  official  proposals  and  Newman's  replies, 
as  well  as  innumerable  addresses  of  congratulations  from  all  parts.  It  is  not  for  the 
addresses  that  we  value  the  book,  but  for  Newman's  replies.  They  give  us  an  insight 
into  a  noble  soul  which  has  been  tried  in  the  furnace  of  misrepresentation  and  suffering, 
but  which  has  come  out  at  once  unscathed  and  beautified.  If  we  could  find  nowhere 
else  a  portrayal  of  Newman's  humility  we  can  see  it  here.  The  book  will  furnish 
material  for  an  important  chapter  in  the  great  life  which  is  still  to  come." — Ilomiletic 
Monthly  and  Catechist. 


PUBLISHED  BY  LONGMANS,   GREEN  &^   CO.         7 

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Epic  on  Ireland,  her  Saint-Apostle,  and  her  marvellous  history.  Every  individual  with 
a  drop  of  Irish  blood  in  his  veins  should  be  proud  to  possess,  and,  by  close  reading,  to 
make  indeed  his  own,  these  eloquent,  dignified,  and  upUfting  pa.ges."—6acred  Heart 
Review. 

"  This  is  the  artistic  portion  of  the  work— and  very  noble  literary  art  it  is.  We  think 
every  Ubrar>-  should  include  this  piece  of  evidence  as  to  the  value  of  style,  as  an  educa- 
tional influence  and  a  mighty  power  over  the  human  soul."— Cat/iok'c  Staiuiard  and 
Times. 


Letters    From    the    Beloved    City.— To  S.  B.,  from    Philip. 

Crown  8vo.  Net,  $0.50 

Contents:  Why  Philip  writes  these  Letters  to  S.  B. — S.  B.'s  Diffi- 
culties fully  stated — The  Good  Shepherd — I  come  that  they  may  have 
life— Feed  my  Lambs. — Feed  my  Sheep— One  Fold  and  One  Shepherd 
—Christ's  Mother  and  Christ's  Church— Unity— Holiness— Catholicity 
— Apostolicit/--Our  Lady's  Dowry— War— Pacification. 

"...  breathe  the  tenderness,  the  forbearance,  the  magnanimity  of  the  Good 
Shepherd.  They  will  undoubtedly  prove  silent  apostles  among  those  who  must  be  ap- 
proached with  calm  dignity,  and  who  are  won  more  by  gentle  persuasiveness  than  by 
vigorous  logic." — Donahoe's  Magazine. 

Gerard.— THE  OLD  RIDDLE  AND  THE  NEWEST 
ANSWER.     By  John  Gerard,  S. J.,  F.L.S.     Crown  Svo,  $2.00 

*i^*  This  is  an  inquiry  as  to  how  far  modern  science  has  altered  the  aspect  of  the  prob- 
lem of  the  Universe. 

Emery.— THE  INNER  LIFE  OF  THE  SOUL.  Short  Spirit- 
ual Messages  for  the  Ecclesiastical  Year.  By  S.  L.  Emery.  Crown 
Svo.     Cloth  extra.  (By  mail,  $1.60)  AV/,  $1.50 

"The  present  volume  is  published  with  the  hope  of  giving  some  idea  of  the  vital  con- 
nection that  the  Ecclesiastical  Seasons,  Doctrines,  and  Sacraments  of  the  Catholic 
Church  have  with  the  Inner  Life  of  the  Christian  soul.  Begun  originally  in  the  form  of 
weekly  contributions  to  the  Sacred  Heart  Reviciv,  the  articles  gradually  assumed  shape 
in  the  direction  here  indicated,  and  are  now  reprinted  by  kind  permission  and  with  care- 
ful advice." — Author's  Pf-eface, 

"  It  is  meet  indeed  that  this  book  should  come  to  us  with  the  Christmas  season,  for  all 
its  messages  are  of  joy  and  peace,  and  every  class  and  condition  of  life  can  draw  from  it 
inspiration  for  happier,  holier  living.  It  is  a  book  to  be  loved  and  treasured,  a  truly 
beautiful  book  replete  with  sweet  consolation  and  uplifting  xhonf^hx.."— Dona  hoe  s 
Magazine. 

"  The  Author's  touch  is  spiritu.al,  but  is  no  less  bracing  on  that  account.  Her  range 
of  thought  is  wide  and  her  svmpathy  stretches  from  the  limits  of  the  human  to  the  un- 
seen angelic.  An  excellent  book  for  meditation  at  this  holy  season,  and  one  that  cannot 
fail  to  serve  the  highest  ends  of  religion."— Ca^/w^/Zc  Standard  and  Times,  Philadelphia. 


Ci)e  ^Beginninss  of  tfje  C|)urc!) 

A  Series  of  Histories  of  the  First  Century 

BY   THE 

ABBE  CONSTANT  FOUARD 

Late  Member  of  the  Biblical  Commission,   formerly   Professor   of   the 
Faculty  of  Theology  at  Rouen,  etc.,  etc. 


This  series  appeals  alike  to  the  student  and  the  lay  reader,  both  for  practical 
use  as  a  handbook  for  the  history  of  the  Apostolic  Age,  and  for  a  narrative  of  the 
times.  The  Author's  system  of  confining  all  matter  of  purely  academic  interest  to 
the  notes,  thus  lea\'ing  the  interest  of  the  text  untrammelled,  adapts  his  books  to  the 
needs  of  the  general  reader,  while  to  the  student  they  appeal  as  a  source  of 
information  and  a  means  of  reference. 


Uniform  Authorized  Translations  as  Follows  : — 

THE  CHRIST  THE  SON  OF  GOD:  A  Life  of  Our  Lord  and 
Saviour  Jesus  Christ.  By  the  Abbe  Constant  Fouard.  Trans- 
lated from  the  Fifth  Edition  with  the  Author's  sanction.  With  an 
Introduction  by  Cardinal  Manning.  Two  vols.,  with  Maps,  small 
8vo,  cloth,  gilt  top,  $4.00. 

"This  singularly  able  and  excellent  work  can  need  no  commendation.  It  is 
already  in  the  fifth  edition.  When  it  first  appeared,  it  had  the  commendation  of  the 
late  Cardinal  do  Bonnechose,  Archbishop  of  Rouen,  who  well  described  it,  as  uniting 
'the  consolations  of  piety  with  the  explanations  of  true  science  on  the  text  of  Scripture.' 
In  i88t,  Leo  XIII.  sent  his  benediction  to  the  author,  and  many  Cardinals  and  a  large 
number  of  the  Bishops  of  France  gave  it  their  approbation." 

— From  Cardinal  Manning's  Introduction. 

ST.  PETER  AND  THE  FIRST  YEARS  OF  CHRISTIANITY. 

With  an  Introduction  by  Cardinal  Gibbons.  In  one  vol.,  with  3 
Maps,  small  8vo,  cloth,  gilt  top,  $2.00. 

ST.  PAUL  AND  HIS  MISSIONS.  In  one  vol.,  with  Maps, 
small  8vo,  cloth,  gilt  top,  $2.00, 

THE  LAST  YEARS  OF  ST.  PAUL.  With  Maps  and  Plans. 
Small  Svo,  cloth,  gilt  top,  $2.00. 

ST.  JOHN  AND   THE  CLOSE  OF  THE  APOSTOLIC  AGE. 

Translated  with  the  sanction  and  co-operation  of  the  Author's 
Executors.  With  a  Portrait  of  the  Abb^:  Fouard.  Small  Svo,  gilt 
top,  net  $1.60,  by  mail  $1.74. 


[Complete  Sets,  6  vols,  in  box,  net  ^9.60,  expressage  additional.] 
LONGMANS,  GREEN  &  CO.,  New  York  and  London 


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